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v o l u m e X X IV. No. 1 january-february, 2010

INDIA INTERNATIONAL CENTRE

EXHIBITION, FILM and TALK: To Mark the Centenary of Dr. Homi Bhabha, January 22

The IIC Annual Day was celebrated as a centenary tribute to the legendary physicist, Dr. Homi J. Bhabha. This included an exhibition, a film and a special lecture by Professor M.G.K. Menon.

The exhibition, with photographs from the TIFR, brought alive the close personal bond between Nehru and Bhabha. Established during a visit to England by ship, when Indira Gandhi was also present, this bond led to the formation of the TIFR and the propelling of India into the nuclear age. Indira Gandhi once said that no matter how busy her father was, he always had time for Homi Bhabha.

The film In Love with India revealed the multi-faceted personality of Homi Bhabha. This was followed by Professor Menon’s lecture, titled ‘Homi Bhabha—A Modern Leonardo da Vinci’. He observed that, like Leonardo da Vinci, Bhabha was a polymath. He also spoke of the strong link between Bhabha and C.D. Deshmukh and C.V. Raman, who said that ‘Bhabha is a great lover of music, a gifted artist, a brilliant engineer and an outstanding scientist’.

Born on October 30, 1909, Homi Bhabha’s life had five distinct phases. The first phase (1909-1927) consisted of early studies in India; the second phase (1927-1939) included studies at the University of Cambridge; 1939-1945 was the continuance of outstanding research at Bangalore’s Indian Institute of Sciences. From 1945 to his tragic death in an aircrash in1966, Bhabha dedicated himself to building institutions, setting up the atomic energy programme and focused on the development of electronics.

The arts he enjoyed, but science was what he wanted to do professionally. He realized early on that he wanted to study Physics and his role model was Paul Dirac. In Cambridge, Bhabha achieved the explanation of relativistic exchange scattering called ‘Bhabha scattering’, among other works. But when he came to India, he realized the role of science in national development.

Professor Menon listed the characteristics of Homi Bhabha as intensity, deepest commitment to nationalism, realization of the importance of energy for development, and vision of abundant economic nuclear power. Underscoring the role of science, the importance of new areas, of institution building, and determination were some other remarkable characteristics.

RACHNA JOSHI

IIC Annual Day

Dr. Homi J. Bhabha

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TALK: Language and Nationalism in Pakistan – The Case of Punjab Speaker: Dr. Alyssa Ayres Chair: Professor Alok Rai, January 7

Pakistani Punjab

Even though Pakistan was founded in 1947 as a homeland for South Asia’s Muslims, it has been beset with conflict and multiple fissures since its inception. Dr. Alyssa Ayres examined the historical vicissitudes right down to the current spectre of Talibanization, and also explored the importance of culture to political legitimacy. As she went over the history of the region, she said early leaders selected the Urdu language to craft a national identity, although it was the language of a miniscule percentage of Pakistanis mainly because it was synonymous with the great Islamic cultural

past. This paradox underscores the importance of cultural policies for national identity formation.

This was the crux of the presentation as she actually investigated the language-culture-nation linkage through the paradigmatic case of Pakistani Punjab, the hub of ‘Punjabiyat’ (Punjabi culture), adopting ‘Urdu’ and forsaking Punjabi. Contrary to its Indian counterpart, the Pakistani Punjab is hegemonic, militarily as well as politically, a fact that makes cultural accreditation an imperative for them.

Like several pacifists on both sides of the border, Ayres advocates the usage of cultural commonalities as a mode to forge peace. In this context, she mentioned ‘Ajoka’, a theatre group that stages Punjabi plays highlighting commonalities on both sides of the border. In his concluding remarks, Alok Rai praised Nehru who allowed India to be split up into linguistic territorial configurations.

GURPREET MAINI

TALK: The Gandhian Movement in Iran Speakers: Dr. Ramin Jahanbegloo; and Professor Ashis Nandy Chair: Professor Shail Mayaram, January 6

Gandhi and Iran

A well-known Professor of Philosophy from the University of Toronto, Dr. Ramin Jahanbegloo is an ardent admirer of Gandhi. He began his lecture by pointing out that the principles of the Islamic Republic of Iran are an outcome of a revolution and popular sovereignty. Since justice and freedom are Republican ideals, political authoritarianism, economic stagnation, a high degree of corruption, and growing violence have eroded popular support for the theocratic regime in Iran. This is why the Gandhian movement has special significance in Iran today.

In the discussion with Ashis Nandy, it was mentioned that the Green movement—very prominent in the June elections—is connected with the colours of Islam and Shi’ism. This civic movement comprises three main groups: the intellectuals, students and women and has gained a moral legitimacy. Iran is presently divided between the moral legitimacy of this civic movement, and the illegitimate or coercive power of the theocracy. This is why the Green movement may become politically strong in the future.

Iran-India relations are centuries old and Gandhian thoughts have an Islamic and Shi’ite connection, said Jahanbegloo. Gandhi had once declared that Pathans were the best satyagrahis. The spirit of Shi’ism in today’s Iran is non-violent and the present language of resistance comes from Iranian rituals and Islamic theology. Modern technology, such as the internet, help to widen these Republican feelings among civil society groups and this development may lead to change.

BERYL ANAND

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Annual C.D. Deshmukh LectureTALK: Tradition, Modernity and Post Modernism in Indian CinemaSpeaker: Shyam BenegalChair: Professor M.G.K. Menon, January 14

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Frontiers of History TALK: Print and Pleasure – Bazaar Poets and Bestsellers of Nineteenth Century Hindi/UrduSpeaker: Dr. Francesca Orsini Chair: Professor Vasudha Dalmia, January 15

Whetting listeners’ appetites for her new book, Print and Pleasure, Francesca Orsini described how in the late nineteenth century registered books formed but islands in a sea of cheap songbooks, barahmasas and tales. They became critical in expanding the reading public, and feeding new forms like theatre, as seen from Radheshyam Kathavachak’s autobiography. Impressive reprint figures, notwithstanding the challenges of attracting predominantly illiterate audiences attuned to performance, suggest a process of cross-fertilization: ‘women’s songs’ were now circulated among bazaar poets, in a supra-local dialect.

Books brought genres together, stimulating, as with Parsi theatre, eclectic tastes, that the self-educated felt

free to mix. New exchanges occurred between Urdu and (variants of) Hindi, even as reformists tried to establish their separate paths: poems oscillated between Urdu and Braja; barahmasas appeared in Urdu, kissas in Devanagari; the two scripts were sometimes printed in parallel. The democratization of reading came through vividly, from Sayyid Ahmad Khan mocking the pretensions of those with mere chapbook literacy, to a reader noting how a serial like Fasana-e Azad benefited those who would not otherwise read newspapers.

Chandrakanta’s investment in wonder over character-building may have meant it later failed Ram Chandra Shukla’s criteria for literature, but not, Orsini contended, that it relied purely on the ingredients of the dāstān to hold readers. It drops dilated description in brief, fast-paced chapters—arguably influenced by the new theatre, naturalizes and familiarizes the strange by providing mechanical explanations for tilism or naming local trees, and effects a Hinduization and domestication of the dāstān with caste framing romance and inheritance driving plot.

NIHARIKA GUPTA

This annual flagship lecture was given by film director Shyam Benegal, who, like his mentor Satyajit Ray, inspired a whole new way of looking at and interpreting the content of Indian cinema, almost as far back as the seventies. Recalling the start of his personal journey, which followed Nehru’s view that communication must carry a hidden message and be a catalyst for social change, Benegal analyzed Indian cinematic trends from the perspective of his own consistent ‘socialist’ agenda, wryly commenting on the labels that have become part of the vocabulary:

new wave, parallel cinema, item number, infotainment, and so on.

Quoting cinema historians and social thinkers of today, as well as Tagore who had recognized it as a new art with great potential; constrained then by

technology and financial limitations, Benegal defined stereotypes of tradition (Indian, good), and modern (Western, evil) in early popular cinema, which was meant for mass entertainment. Modernism brought big ideas—equality, industrial growth, democracy—that motivated him and would engage more serious audiences. Today, the ‘modern’ has been propelled into the ‘post modern’ with the deluge of mass media, and a market-driven economy that motivates the content of Indian films. Moral distinctions have failed. Success is the new buzzword, and rural life has been pushed aside by a glamorous urban culture.

RAZIA GROVER

Shyam Benegal

This book discussion provided an insight into the life and works of Lord Keynes and explained his current importance. While Professor Nayak, provided the salient features of the entire life of Keynes, Dr. Rajiv Kumar spelt out what makes Keynes the most remembered and followed economist today.

Keynes received the best education from premier schools and colleges: Eton and King’s College, Cambridge. In addition, he received private lectures from the noted economist Sir Alfred Marshall, which

significantly shaped his career. While serving in the India Office during his tenure in the civil services, Keynes wrote his first major book India-Currency and Finance, which even today serves as the base for the Gold Standard. Keynes’ strong interests in fine arts, painting and ballet are reflected in his approach to economics wherein he looked at the subject not merely as a technical discipline, but one with strong links to other fields of study: sociology, culture and psychology.

The reason why Keynes has resurfaced and still widely regarded as the ‘Father of Macroeconomics’, is because he was a proponent of government spending and intervention, as well as a great supporter of public policy making, and globalization. After the global financial crisis of 2008, these have emerged as important topics of study. However, Keynes was opposed to revenue deficits, and urged that governments should strive hard to reduce ‘uncertainty’, which is the main characteristic of any economic system.

JYOTHI KRISHNAMOORTHY

BOOK DISCUSSION: Keynes – The Twentieth Century’s Most Influential Economist by Peter ClarkeSpeakers: Professor Pulin B. Nayak, andDr. Rajiv Kumar Chair: Dr. Shankar N. Acharya January 5

Remembering Keynes

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Violence and Memory TALK: Violence and Memory in the Andes: The Case of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in Peru.Speaker: Professor Felix Reategui-CarilloChair: Dr. Nandini Sundar. February 24

The Andean region has witnessed a plethora of violent civil wars, Maoist movements and gross human rights violations. Reategui-Carillo provided the historical context of this institutionalized violence, or the ‘violence of voicelessness’. Though Latin American States gained independence by the 1820s, power merely changed hands from the caudillos to the oligarchs who regarded the life-style of the indigenous people as ‘barbarian’ who had to be ‘civilized.’ Reategui-Carillo

elaborated Latin America’s authoritarian tradition by categorizing it as: personalized, institutionalized and populist authoritarianism.

The second part of his lecture was devoted to the violence perpetrated by the Shining Path in Peru. Even though the Shining Path claimed to work for their rights and dignity, it was the Kechua people who bore the major brunt of Maoist depredations. The Peruvian state fought terror with terror, making it the worst violator of human rights.

This was the background for Peru’s setting up a Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which adopted a victim-oriented approach. What the Commission did was to set the record straight, provide dignity to the victims and restore truth with memory. Sadly, what the country has achieved is peace without justice, as the attitude of the state has been what can be summed up as ‘we accept but will not comply.’

ASH NARAIN ROY

diary literature

Crime and LiteratureTALK: The Shape of an Elephant – The Publishing Over Long Years of Translations of Literature and CrimeSpeaker: Christopher MacLehoseChair: Mukul Kesavan, January 18

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A heart-warming talk on a cold day is perhaps a good description of Christopher MacLehose’s amusing recollections of his long publishing life. Regarded as a doyen in his field and blessed with an unerring instinct for picking winners, MacLehose has a long line of famous authors behind him. From P.G. Wodehouse to the current cult crime fiction writer, Stieg Larsson, he has handled the work of such brilliant writers as Bernard Malamud, Toni Morrison and George Macdonald Fraser, among others. It is perhaps for

this that he was given the London International Book Fair Lifetime Achievement award in 2006.

MacLehose spoke with humour of his personal experiences in the course of his association with famous writers and publishers but the thrust of his talk was on how important it is for publishers to be good editors as well. It was interesting to learn that just three per cent of British publishing is devoted to translations. This is why Britain remains so isolated from Europe, he felt. He also expressed his anxieties about the recent mergers of small but important publishing houses and the fallout of this on the future of publishing. His own life is a reflection of this trend, for after many years of working for small publishing houses that were merged or shut down, he started his own imprint. His special fondness for crime fiction because he believes that good crime fiction is a mirror to the social world of that country, was another interesting thought he left his audience to mull over.

IRA PANDE

YearningTHEATRE: Yearning, presented by Ruth Wieder-MaganCollaboration: Theatre Company Jerusalem, The Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs, The Israel Lottery Council for the Arts, and the Embassy of Israel in India, January 30

There is a sound that is human and is the subtext of any language. It lingers in folk traditions across the Earth, from the Bauls of Bengal to the chants of the American Indians. When Ruth Wieder-Magan took the stage, she was the very centre of this sound, the primordial source of a human cry. Declaring that underpinning all emotion is ‘Yearning’, she held the audience spellbound by giving it a powerful voice. Visually too, her presence—with her cascading hair and robes evocative of an ancient Greek tragic figure —was riveting.

The jewel of the performance was the ‘Song of Genesis’. This composition resulted from her search into the ‘vibratory nature of the sounds of language together with the musical modes of the Middle East.’ Ruth expanded in song, letters from the Hebrew alphabet. ‘Mem,’ she said, ‘is the complete letter... Mem emerged from ...Mother... the sound Mem lives in our wombs.’ This sound drew the audience deep within and the sound of ‘hey, hey, hey’ as it rose in an echoing crescendo transported us from our earthly moorings, giving our spirits flight.

Mark Eliyahu-Dagestan on the Kamance provided a perfect counter point, as he merged Hebrew songs with Middle Eastern melodic modes. The sound was ancient and contemporary, at times evocative of a Western violin solo, at others an Eastern sarod. The clarinet played by Daniel Yakobsan provided a steady, tanpura like drone.

Ruth’s ‘cry from the heart’ found an echo in the low voice of someone sitting behind me, and for once I didn’t mind—he was crying out for us all.

MALATI SHAH

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Reading HistoryFILMS: Reading History – A Festival of Documentaries, January 15 —17

There was a time when documentaries were regularly shown in cinema halls just before the screening of the feature film but today, it is

no longer so easy to view a well-made documentary film. This interesting festival was thus a treat with a wide range of documentaries (from a personal eulogy to the city of Liverpool by Terence Davies, to Iran’s rebel voices and lessons from the life of Robert McNamara), interspersed with talks and discussions. The festival highlighted several new developments in the genre with an emphasis on particularly innovative, seminal films. The making of documentaries now includes archival material, cartoons, paintings and the reconstruction of specific events by using actors on location; the aim is to hold the audience by enhancing the dramatic quotient.

Several films certainly succeeded in this aim. In Michael Woods’ The Story of India, Woods was almost one of the main actors, often visible as he went from one location to another, even taking part in holi celebrations to illustrate the diversity and wealth of Indian culture. Simon Schama’s A History of Britain, on the other hand, kept a certain distance as befits a professor. Understandably, not all films were of the same quality as these two. The Last Days of the Raj, to mention one, was particularly weak and rather shoddily constructed.

The discussions and talks were a fascinating and insightful counter-point to the films. And here Christopher Mitchell, curator of the festival, took the lead by highlighting in some detail how precisely the makers of these films went about

presenting—rather than representing—chosen themes. He stressed that there was a lot of good work going on in the UK and the USA, often unseen in India. Such work was so original in its approach that it was worthwhile to hold a festival of these documentaries, he said. The standards for such presenter-led films have been evolved over the years by maestros, such as Jacob Bronowski, David Attenborough and Kenneth Clark. There was always more than one authentic narrative to choose from, though there may well have been disagreement about their relative authenticity; it was for the presenter to decide which one to depict. Indeed the debate about interpretation versus authenticity continued and is bound to rage on.

This intelligent combination of films, discussions and talks proved to be an intensely engaging experience, not just for film buffs, but for all those who have over the years taken an incidental but continuing interest in the documentary as form.

I.P. KHOSLA6

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Danielou and BurnierFILMS, EXHIBITION and DISCUSSION: India Through the Lenses of Alain Danielou and Raymond Burnier (1936 – 1960)Collaboration: Alain Danielou India Committee, January 20 – 28

In 1932, Frenchman Alain Danielou and Raymond Burnier from Switzerland came to Shantiniketan with their cameras, paints and sketch books, where they spent four years at the invitation of Rabindranath Tagore. While Burnier concentrated on photography, Danielou actively collaborated in a musical enterprise of the transcription and arrangement of some of Tagore’s songs, ‘so that they could be performed by Westerners’.

By the end of the 1930s, when the duo moved to Varanasi from Shantiniketan, they had

begun a fascinating process of visually documenting Indian society.

Their oeuvre was well represented in this exhibition, a selection of black-and-white photographs from the Alain Danielou/Raymond Burnier photo collection to represent the various phases in the life of the two artists. It also showcased what were perhaps among the earliest photographs of Khajuraho and other temple architecture.

Interestingly, not a single image that featured a woman or girl was visible in this display. Apart from providing a microcosmic view of each phase of the photographers’ work, the exhibition was a fine example of the evolution in styles of representation. Above all, in many imaginatively composed portraits, it was as though the individuals were seeking engagement, if not conversation, with the viewer.

MALAVIKA KARLEKAR

Tagore’s Valmiki Pratibha PERFORMANCE: Valmiki Pratibha, an opera by Rabindranath Tagore Presented by the Tagoreans, UK Directed by Gairika GuptaCollaboration: Impresario India, January 31

The Tagoreans from UK brought back the Tagore era in this immortal opera. Directed by Gairika Gupta, who kept its vintage flavour intact, it was a ‘house full’ show.

Valmiki Pratibha (The genius of Valmiki) is based on the story of the epic poet Valmiki, originally the robber chief (Ratnakar), who was moved by the grief of a crane on witnessing its mate being killed by a hunter. His compassion breaks out into an impromptu metrical lament, an ‘Anushtup Sanskrit shloka’ the

metre in which he later composed the great epic Ramayana.

This musical drama documented the complete spiritual transformation of the dacoit Ratnakar into the saint Valmiki. The back drop of the stage and the music created an appropriate atmosphere for changing emotions throughout the drama, in its different episodes. The music was a judicious blend of foreign and native melodies that ranged from Irish to Indian classical music, and from folk to Rabindra Sangeet. The whole gamut of Rasa-Bhava (such as anger, sorrow, joy and wonder) during the dance-drama were depicted with a cascade of musical emotions gushing forth, by loosening the chains of melodic forms and making them adaptable to a variety of treatments to match various situations. The well-trained dancers did full justice to the poetry and music that kept the audience spellbound.

MANJARI SINHA

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The screening of this five-part documentary and the lively discussion that followed resurrected the times when melody, lyrics, composition and rendition were an act of love, faith and conviction. A compilation of interviews with the best talent of Hindi cinema and song extracts from the golden years of Hindi cinema, Kabir’s documentary highlighted a time when filmmaking was driven by social concerns, and the films’ protagonists were extensions of the masses involved in the gruelling, albeit joyous, task of nation-building.

Many of these memorable songs that still return to haunt us were sung by KL Saigal, Noor Jehan,

ILLUSTRATED LECTURE: Mumbai – Theatre of Conflict, City of HopeSpeaker: Professor Miriam Dossal, author of Mumbai – Theatre of Conflict, City of Hope–1660 to Present Times (Oxford University Press 2010) Chair: A.G.K. Menon, February 5

City of Conflict

It is a truth universally acknowledged that in order to plan the future, we must understand the past. Dossal’s compelling narrative—and her book—attempt to do just that by examining the serious challenges before the city, and how the politics of land use has impacted Mumbai and Mumbaikars.

Dossal’s presentation tracked the history of Mumbai from its beginnings in 1660, to show how seven small islands developed into an industrial megapolis. Her research took her into the past, especially the archives of the Land Records Office, first set up by the British

to develop a state apparatus and political legitimacy. The records revealed patterns of land use and property transactions based on religious tolerance and political security, which laid the standards for creating a market in land. The eventual development of Bombay’s civic infrastructure—its cotton mills, docks and railways and its rise as a colonial city, rather than a colonial port—were based on these standards.

Using rare maps, drawings, sketches and archival photographs to illustrate her arguments, Dossal briefly discussed the three seminal land revenue surveys, and specifically the hitherto unknown and earliest survey of its kind conducted by Thomas Dickinson from 1811-27 that is distinguished by its sheer retrieval of history of the period. All three, including the two conducted in 1865-72 and 1912-15, are used to arbitrate land disputes even today. She also touched on the contributions of Mumbai’s earliest communities, the importance of reclamation in its expansion, the development of business districts, and its distinctive architecture.

RITU SINGH

A Golden AgeFILM: What’s Behind the song in Hindi films? Screening of a film followed by a presentation – The Golden Years of Indian Cinema. A film by Nasreen Munni KabirChair: Prof. Shohini Ghosh, February 3

Khursheed Bano, Suraiya—actors themselves. Singers in those times shared a sense of camaraderie amongst themselves—divisive caste politics was an alien concept—and voice and persona became firmly identified with individual actors, such as Mukesh and Raj Kapoor.

Lyricists and composers were a varied group too: the political activist, the humorous ever-youthful poet-lyricist, or the simple worshipper of words immaculately clad in melody. Matching musical metre to lyrics was no mean feat for composer and lyricists, nor was eliciting the right delivery and diction from a singer always easy. And beyond the score and song lay the vast uncharted territory of spoken or emoted lyrics and the equally significant canvas of background music.

By the ’80s the ‘discofication’ of song and melody threw up the impossible challenge of fitting the Indian musical, especially folk, ethos into a range of Western beats.

DIPA CHAUDHURI

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India and AfricaINAUGURATION: International seminar on India and Africa – Partnership for Capacity Building and Human Resource Development Collaboration: African Studies Association of India, and Indian Council for Cultural Relations, February 9

This international seminar was a follow up of the India-Africa Forum Summit held in New Delhi in 2009.

Dr. Karan Singh, President of the ICCR, welcomed the participants, who included a number of diplomats, heads of institutions from Africa and India, as well as academics and social scientists. He traced the

historical linkages and political foundations of India and Africa that go back centuries to the time when maritime trade first brought the two land masses on either side of the Indian Ocean together. Today, this exchange has expanded to embrace issues such as education, food and energy security, climate change and healthcare, he pointed out. These are areas of mutual concern and such interactions are bound to promote greater cooperation and understanding. With the ICCR opening India Centres all over Asia and Africa, and more scholarships to African countries, the bond had strengthened.

Professor M.G.K. Menon, President of IIC, spoke of the deep relationship of the Centre and university faculties and welcomed the participation of members who were interested in education. He concluded by saying that it was a unique honour to have a meeting on Africa.

Charu Gupta, assistant professor of history at Delhi University, gave a lecture on ‘Sex and the Archive’ at the IIC on February 19.

The lecture dwelt on the topic of sex and what could be known about it from the archive in the first decades of the twentieth century. The term ‘archive’ here refers to libraries and similar institutes in cities such as Benares, Allahabad, Kanpur, and Lucknow.

The item was largely woven around sexuality and obscenity. Gupta revisited and studied what constituted peripheral sources of this topic. The subjects of her investigation were women, homosexuals and lower castes, all in a colonized set-up. The running theme was the intersection of sexuality and colonial identity.

TALK: Sex and the Archive in Colonial India Speaker: Dr. Charu Gupta Chair: Dr. Brinda Bose, February 19

Frontiers of HistorySexuality was visible at home and the family. There was evidence of it in sanitation and health. If there was sexuality, there was also proof of its suppression in the gossips and rumours of the day.

The colonial imposition of the Victorian code of morals, particularly on caste-Hindus, could be seen, though of course there was no single code of morality. The implicit relationship between sexuality and power was identified, and expressed in diverse ways. Sexuality often permeated caste hierarchies.

Here sexuality refers not just to male-female relationships. The Jails Enquiry Committee had referred to male-male bonding, which led to ‘moral contamination’. Author Pandey Bechayan Sharma wrote a book called Chocolate, which had young good-looking boys as homosexual partners. The book sold well but was banned. Mahatma Gandhi had criticised the book, however.

Yashoda Devi, a woman ayurvedic doctor, wrote forty books in Hindi on the subjects of family, gender and sexuality. There were representations of Dalit women in didactic sexual terms. However, they remained a footnote in the writing of the day.

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An interactive session for children was held at the Gandhi-King Plaza at IIC on February 20. Deepa Agarwal and Devika Rangachari, both popular children’s writers, conducted interesting sessions with the students. Ranjit Lal, who is an expert on birds in Delhi, led a nature walk around Lodhi Gardens.

The event started off with an environment quiz by Devika Rangachari. It incorporated questions such as ‘Is plastic biodegradable?’ and ‘What kind of rain is made up of chemicals and is harmful to us?’. The children, who were from schools such as Bluebells and St. Mary’s, were extremely enthusiastic and responsive. Some had even dressed up as leaves, clouds or the sun and were given prizes for each correct answer they gave.

This was followed by an interesting book reading by Deepa Agarwal, where she talked about her new title, The Mango Birds. Simultaneously, some students went

on a nature walk with Ranjit Lal, where they spotted various birds such as bulbul, brown-headed barbet, Indian Moor Hen and also learnt about their habitats. While telling the students how wrong it is to cage birds, Ranjit Lal told them, ‘I think people cage birds because they are jealous they can fly.’

After these educative sessions, there was a fun magic show for children by Ishan Shivkumar, an eleventh grade student at Sardar Patel School. It was a spectacular show and the children loved it. It was a thoroughly enjoyable way to spend a Saturday morning.

MOHINI GUPTA

TALK: Telling Tales Under Trees – storytelling, an environmental quiz, a nature walk with Ranjit LalOrganized with Deepa Agarwal and Devika Rangachari, February 20

Telling Tales Under Trees

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ObituaryA-4654 Shri Ram Gopal Nayar A-5200 Ms. Santosh MalhotraL. 0266 Shri S.K. Singh M-1012 Dr. Rajendra AwasthyM-1288 Shri S.K. Banerji M-1376 Shri Y.R. MehtaM-1902 Shri S. Grover M-2114 Shri P. UpendraM-2305 Mr. Simon Digby M-2638 Shri Gopi K. AroraM-3141 Professor R.C. Sharma

The IIC Staff have been trained to administer first aid in emergencies. However, members who require specialized medical attention in an emergency are requested to furnish relevant information and contact numbers to the Centre of the family members who are to be contacted on their behalf.

Medical Emergency

The IIC welcomes suggestions and feedback from its Members every month.

Feedback

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diary futures

Lectures

Water: The Stuff of Life: Lecture Series12 May at 6:30 pm in Conference Room – IWetland Ecology and the Yamuna Biodiversity ParkSpeaker: Prof. C.R. Balu

11 June at 6:30 pm in Conference Room – IWater for Food, Water for LifeSpeaker: Mr. Bharat Sharma, Head, International Water Management Institute

Performances

26 March at 6:30 pm in the Annexe AuditoriumAnhad Naad - Pakhawaj and Tabla Duet

Presented by Arun Kumar on the pakhawaj, and Madhuresh Bhatt on the tabla.

1 April at 6:30 pm in the AuditoriumKathak RecitalBy Alakananda from Delhi, disciple of Guru Munna Lal ShuklaPanorama of Bengal’s Art Heritage: A Festival – 2nd to 4th April 2010: At the Gandhi-King Plaza

On 2 April at 6:30 pmThe Great SentinelA compilation of Tagore’s songs and writings with English narrationPresented by Rabigeetika, DelhiDirection: Sudhir Chanda

Raas LeelaDance choreography based on Padabali Kirtan (Odissi Style)

Choreography: Debamitra SenguptaProduction: Mayur Lalit, Kolkata

On 3 April at 6:30 pmRecitation of Bengali Poems “Banglar Kabita”By Bisakha Mukherjee from Kolkata

An Evening of Bengali Songs “Banglar Gaan”By Srikanto Acharya from Kolkata

On 4 April at 6:30 pmAnamni AnganaA play based on a story taken from the MahabharataDirected by Bijolakshmi BarmanFollowed byMuktir PathDance choreographies with live music from Tagore’s creations: Bhanusungher Padabali, Chitarangada and Taser DeshChoreography: Kalavati Devi

23 April at 6:30 pm in the AuditoriumHindustani Classical Music – Sitar RecitalBy Subho Chakrabarty from Kolkata, disciple of Guru Debiprasad Chatterjee and Partha Chatterjee

Film19 April at 6:30 pm in the AuditoriumFilms on Spirituality and FaithAdi Shankaracharya (120 min; dvd; English subtitles)A film by G.V. Iyer

The only film ever to be made in classic Sanskrit, this multiple award-winning film is based on the life of one of the greatest thinkers the Indian sub-continent has ever known, Adi Shankaracharya

8 to 13 April in the Foyer outside the AuditoriumThe Stilwell RoadAn exhibition of photographs taken during the expedition which traced the road created during World War II from Kunming in Yunan Province in South West China through Upper Myanmar to Arunachal Pradesh and Assam in India

Photographs by Dileep Banerjee.

Highlights for March-April 2010

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Reg. No. 28936/77

miscellany diary

The IIC-Asia Project, as a culmination of its earlier initiatives and programmes, had released three publications in March 2009. One amongst these was ‘Speaking for Myself: An Anthology of Asian Women’s Writing’. The publication had been well received and there were several reviews. Another launch of this publication took place in Kolkata on January 31, 2010 at the initiative of the Prabha Khaitan Foundation, a social NGO devoted to the betterment in the area of education, culture, art and literature. Sundeep Bhutoria, Trustee of the Foundation, had widely circulated copies of the volume amongst scholars and institutions.

The book was launched by Mrinal Sen, eminent film maker, with Dr. Kapila Vatsyayan in the Chair. Sunil Gangopadhyay, President, Sahitya Akademi, Nabaneeta Dev Sen, Founder President, West Bengal

Women Writers Association, Reba Som, Director, Tagore Centre, Kolkata and Dr. Kavita Sharma, Director, IIC also spoke at the function. Six contributors to the volume from abroad who were present for the launch - Donia Gobar (Afghanistan), Kishwar Naheed (Pakistan), Kunzang Choden (Bhutan), Manju Tiwari (Nepal), Putsata Raeng (Cambodia) and Shun Ling Agnes Lam (Hong Kong), read out their poems. The book launch was preceded in the forenoon by a round table discussion on Asian Women’s Writing, moderated by Director, IIC. Participants included some eminent writers of Bengal, such as Mahashweta Devi, Amalendu Dey, Bani Basu, Bharati Ray, Dibyendu Palit, Geetesh Sharma and Jasohdara Bagchi, as also contributors to the volume from abroad. The editors of the volume—Professors Sukrita Paul Kumar and Malashri Lal—also spoke at the functions.

The Anthology, a collection of stories and poems by women writers from thirty-two Asian countries, was highly appreciated as a unique one of its kind.

TALK: The Diamond Jubilee of the Election Commission of India – Retrospect and ProspectSpeaker: Dr. S.Y. Quraishi, January 20

Jewel in the Crown

One of the most respected and credible institutions of India, the Election Commission has played a sterling role in conducting polls for the largest electorate in the world at 6,87,407 polling stations. The journey from the use of separate boxes for political parties to the use of one box, and then the electronic voting machine in order to preserve the secrecy of identity and prevent malpractices was delineated by Dr. Quraishi, member of the Commission, while celebrating the golden jubilee of the institution.

The Commission has endeavoured to undertake constant reforms in updating electoral rolls by the process of computerization, issue of photo identity cards; ensuring the fidelity of the rolls in

view of the shifted, the absent, and the dead; and compulsory identification of the voter before voting. Its moral code for the parties and the candidates is stringent. Its control over the official machinery is total and unquestioned. Its recent innovations in the form of booth level officers and agents, use of electronic-tracking, micro-observers, video-recording, satellite-phone, and webcasting as weapons of surveillance,—all with a view to purifying the process of its possible infirmities—are commendable.

Not content with its achievements, the Commission is constantly pursuing reforms by dealing with issues of surrogate advertising through the use of paid news; preventing criminals from contesting elections; addressing the apathy of urban electorates; providing for the rejection of all candidates; elimination of money power; seeking powers to deregister fake political parties, and finally by proposing false declaration by a candidate as a criminal offence. These measures are likely to purify the process.

P.S. BAWA

Book Launch

This issue of the Diary has been assembled and edited by Ira Pande, Chief Editor; Rachna Joshi, Senior Asst. Editor; and Ritu Singh, Asst. Editor. Published by Ravinder Datta, for the India International Centre, 40, Max Mueller Marg, New Delhi-110 003. Designed by Poonam Bevli Sahi at FACET Design, D-9, Defence Colony, New Delhi - 110 024, Ph: 24616720, 24624336 and printed by Mastan Singh at I.G. Printers, 104, DSIDC Shed, Okhla Phase-I, New Delhi - 110 020.