Wednesday, April 13 2005 13:57 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Houston: Five Indian Americans, including noted authors Pico Iyer and Rohinton Mistry, have received the prestigious John Simon Guggenheim Foundation fellowships for the year 2005 for distinguished achievements in their fields.

The Guggenheim Foundation, a New York-based organisation devoted to furthering the development of scholars and artistes, has awarded $ 7,112,000 for the year among 186 fellows, according to a release in Houston.

Pico Iyer, born in England to Indian parents, immigrated to California, and is one of the most revered and respected travel writers alive.

He was educated at Eton, Oxford, and Harvard. Iyer's recent books include 'Abandon', a novel, and 'Sun After Dark', a set of linked essays.

Rohinton Mistry, born in India and of Parsi descent immigrated to Canada and is an award-winning writer based in Ontario.

Mistry is the author of 'A Fine Balance', which won him the Giller Prize, the Royal Society of Literature's Winfried Holtby Prize, and the 1996 Los Angeles Times Award for fiction. The novel also made it to the short-list of nominees for the Booker Prize, and was the basis for a 1998 film of the same title.

He published his first novel, 'Such a Long Journey', in 1991, for which he received the Commonwealth Writer's Prize for Best Book.

The foundation has since 1925, granted almost $ 240 million in fellowships to over 15,500 individuals.