Premchand
Indian writer of Hindi and Urdu fiction (1880–1936); pioneer of social realism in Hindustani literature
Dhanpat Rai Srivastava (31 July 1880 – 8 October 1936), better known as Munshi Premchand based on his pen name Premchand (pronounced [preːm t͡ʃənd̪] ), was an Indian writer famous for his modern Hindustani literature.
Premchand was a pioneer of Hindi and Urdu social fiction. He was one of the first authors to write about caste hierarchies and the plight of women and labourers of the late 1880s. He is one of the most celebrated writers of the Indian subcontinent, and is regarded as one of the foremost Hindi writers of the early twentieth century. His works include Godaan, Karmabhoomi, Gaban, Mansarovar, and Idgah. He published his first collection of five short stories in 1907 in a book called Soz-e-Watan (Sorrow of the Nation).
His works include more than a dozen novels, around 300 short stories, several essays and translations of a number of Indian and foreign literary works into Hindi.
Biography
Early life
Premchand was born on 31 July 1880 in Lamhi, a village located near Banaras, and was named Dhanpat Rai ("master of wealth"). His ancestors came from a large Chitraguptavanshi Kayastha family, which owned eight to nine bighas of land. His grandfather, Guru Sahai Rai, was a patwari (village land record-keeper), and his father, Ajaib Lal, was a post office clerk.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Premchand” as indian writer of Hindi and Urdu fiction (1880–1936); pioneer of social realism in Hindustani literature. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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Chronology provides the most reliable spine for this subject; interpretation should follow only after identities and dates are secure. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 21, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q174152. VIAF identifies the subject as 95216097. The Library of Congress control number is n50029263. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1880, 1936 and 1907.
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This entry incorporates text from “Premchand” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.