Bishnu Dey was a leading Bengali poet, writer, essayist, academician, art appreciator, and connoisseur in the era of modernism and post-modernism.

The Jnanpith Award is the oldest and the highest Indian literary award presented annually by the Bharatiya Jnanpith to an author for their "outstanding contribution towards literature". Instituted in 1961, the award is bestowed only on Indian writers writing in Indian languages included in the Eighth Schedule to the Constitution of India and English, with no posthumous conferral.