Jeet Thayil became the first Indian to win the South Asian literature prize after he was announced the winner of the $50,000 award Friday.

Indian poet Jeet Thayil was nominated for his debut novel "Narcopolis" that tells a story of the opium dens of old Bombay. Poet K Satchidandan who is the chair of judges for the 2013 prize said the winning novel dealt with the complexities of globalization and the modern world "with extreme verbal artistry and lyrical intensity".

"Narcopolis mixes fantasy and reality to create a powerful story that deals with a less known aspect of life in a metropolis like Bombay," he said, "where episodes collapse into one another as in the tales of Vikramaditya telling an interminable tale about the less fortunate and the less visible human beings of the city."

Malaysian author Tan Twan Eng was also nominated owing to his novel "The Garden of Evening Mists", that tells the story of aftermath of the Japanese occupation of Malaysia.

Other contenders for the prize included Turkish Nobel laureate Orhan Pamuk for his novel "Silent House," which chair of judges' journalist Maya Jaggi is a "dark family" set in a "decrepit mansion at a Turkish seaside resort, on the eve of a military coup".

Japanese writer Hiromi Kawakami was also one of the 5 shortlisted candidates for his book "The Briefcase", in which the "ambiguous relationship between an office worker nearing 40 and her former literature teacher, a retired widower, is traced with astonishing delicacy and humor", said Jaggi, Pakistani writer Musharraf Ali Farooqi also made it to the list for his novel "Between Clay and Dust."