Jaya Madhavan

Jaya Madhavan (born 1 October 1972) is an Indian author, The New Indian Express columnist and comic creator. She is a winner of The Children's Book Trust's All India Competition for Writers of Children's Books.

Jaya Madhavan was born in Madras, India, to Narayanswamy and Visalam. She is the second of four siblings (one of whom is film-maker Karthik Ganesh, and another her co-author for Antidep). She is married to Carnatic musician Madhavan Gopalarathnam, and has two children. She currently resides in Chennai. She is the granddaughter of Seetha doraiswamy.

Her first novel, Sita and the Forest Bandits, was awarded the first prize in the Children Book Trust’s All India Competition for Writers of Children’s Books in 2001. Her second book for young adults Kabir The Weaver Poet is a heavily research backed novel reaching the Top 15 reading ist for young adults and was published by Tulika Publications. Her short stories and poems for adults have been published in Unisun's Anthologies and in the South Asian Literary Journal. She runs a weekly column called "Loony Life" for The New Indian Express and is currently working on her third novel. Every fortnight her Antidep comic strip (created along with her sister) can be seen in The New Indian Express's Saturday Zeitgeist feature.