The 52-year-old Ahmedabad born writer has been chosen for the 10,000-pound Forward Prize for her collection Pure Lizard.
The writer whose poem Search for my tongue is familiar to many students in Britain, currently resides in Germany with her husband and daughter.
The six poets have been short-listed from 133 collections. Others chosen are Jamie McKendrick, Mick Imlah, Catherine Smith, Jane Griffiths and Jen Hadfield.
Bhatt is the recipient of various awards, including the Commonwealth Poetry Prize (Asia) and has published six collection of poems, including Monkey Shadows in 1991 and Augatora in 2000. Her works have been been translated into more than 20
languages.
Jamie McKendrick won the prize in 1997 and is on the list for his fifth collection, Crocodiles and Obelisks.
Mick Imlah, who published his first collection in 1988, waited 20 years to follow it up this year with The Lost Leader.
Catherine Smith, a creative writing tutor at Sussex University, has been chosen for Lip while Jane Griffiths, an English lecturer at Bristol University, for Another Country.
Jen Hadfield who lives in Shetland working as a poet, tutor, artist and occasional shop assistant, is short-listed for her second collection Nigh-No-Place, which she wrote in Canada.
