January 21-26, 2025 Kolkata
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The Kolkata Literary Meet (Kalam) - the city’s annual date with books and ideas - is back with its thirteenth edition. Browse through the schedule below, bookmark the dates and look forward to a stimulating literary experience.
(Winner of the 2019 Booker Prize for her novel: Girl, Woman, Other)
Bernardine Evaristo
Francesc Miralles on his iconic book, Ikigai, and why it resonates with the youth across the globe. In conversation with Ruchira Das
Francesc Miralles
Ruchira Das
A play by Girish Karnad featuring Shabana Azmi. Directed by Alyque Padamsee; Produced by Raell Padamsee’s ACE Productions
Shabana Azmi
Shabana Azmi and Rajit Kapur discuss the impact of the filmmaker on the country’s cinema. In conversation with Priyanka Roy
Shabana Azmi
Rajit Kapur
Priyanka Roy
Angela Saini on how men came to rule the world. In conversation with Sumona Chakravarty
Angela Saini
Sumona Chakravarty
Kanan Gill discusses his debut book. In conversation with Ankita Mukherji
Kanan Gill
Ankita Mukherjii
Abraham Verghese on the influences that shaped his writing. In conversation with Sandip Roy
Abraham Verghese
Sandip Roy
Venki Ramakrishnan discusses science and philosophy in man’s quest for immortality. In conversation with Somak Roy Chowdhury
Venki Ramakrishnan
Somak Raychaudhury
Dayanita Singh talks about her book, the art and how they segue into each other. Presentation followed by conversation with Malavika Banerjee
Dayanita Singh
A Musical Performance by Harpreet based on Bullhe Shah’s Sufi lyrics from Murty Classical Library of India
Harpreet
Defne Suman discusses her novel and a muse called Istanbul. In conversation with Chinmoy Guha
Defne Suman
Chinmoy Guha
A reading of Avik Chanda’s play by Barun Chanda and Vinay Sharma
Barun Chanda
Vinay Sharma
Reading by Somak of Bibhutibhushan Bandyapadhyay’s short story, Einstein O Indubala
Somak Ghosh
Writing in different ages and stages of one’s life. Readings and reflections by Anindya Chatterjee, Anupam Roy and Srijato. In conversation with Roopsha Dasguupta
Anindya Chatterjee
Anupam Roy
Roopsha Dasguupta
Srijato
Bernardine Evaristo’s guidelines for a life in literature. In conversation with Shahana Chatterjee
Bernardine Evaristo
Manu S. Pillai on his new book. In conversation with Sujaan Mukherjee
Manu S Pillai
Sujaan Mukherjee
Francesc Miralles discusses his new book. In conversation with Mitakshara Kumari
Francesc Miralles
Abraham Verghese discusses his best-selling epic with Malavika Banerjee
Abraham Verghese
Sheena Patel on her award-winning debut novel. In conversation with Shahana Chatterjee
Sheena Patel
Angela Saini, (TBA), Srijato and Venki Ramakrishnan in conversation with Malavika Banerjee
Angela Saini
Srijato
Venki Ramakrishnan
Rajesh Patil and Veena Raman discuss chronicles of police and bureaucratic life. In conversation with Mrityunjay Singh
Rajesh Patil
Veena Raman
Mrityunjay Singh
Sangeeta Bahadur and Koral Dasgupta discuss the women of myth and fantasy. In conversation with (TBA)
Sangeeta Bahadur
Koral Dasgupta
Defne Suman and Saras Manickam discuss how secrets and shadows of history make the women in their stories. In conversation with Antara Dutta
Defne Suman
Saras Manickam
Sanghamitra Chakraborty discusses her book on the thespian with Poulami Chatterjee Bose. In conversation with Priyadarshinee Guha
Sanghamitra Chakraborty
Poulami Chatterjee Bose
Jayasri Burman and Arunava Sinha speak about her book and tryst with art. In conversation with Sujoy Prasad Chatterjee (Introduction by Sunaina Anand)
Arunava Sinha
Sujoy Prasad Chatterjee
A play by Samuho, directed by Titas Dutta
Samuho
Aadrit Banerjee’s poetry has been published by the Kolkata Centre for Creativity, DoubleSpeak Magazine, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, The Blacksheep and other literary platforms. Born and raised in Kolkata, and currently based out of Delhi, he has been a research fellow with Wikimedia Foundation and The Heritage Lab and Nazariya Foundation, working in the field of community-oriented heritage conservation from an intersectional gender and sexualities studies discipline. A regular in the slam poetry circuit, his spoken word performances have been featured by PoemsIndia. He is currently pursuing a Master’s in English Literature from St. Stephen’s College, University of Delhi.
Abraham Verghese, MD, MACP, is Professor and Linda R. Meier and Joan F. Lane Provostial Professor and Vice Chair for the Theory and Practice of Medicine at the School of Medicine at Stanford University. Originally from Kerala, he is also a best-selling author and a physician with a reputation for his focus on healing in an era where technology often overwhelms the human side of medicine. He received the Heinz Award in 2014 and was awarded the National Humanities Medal, presented by President Barack Obama, in 2015. His early years as an orderly, his care of terminal AIDS patients and the insights he gained from the deep relationships he formed and the suffering he witnessed were transformative. These were the cumulative experiences around which his first book, My Own Country: A Doctor’s Story (1994), is centered. It was chosen as one of the Best Books of the Year by TIME and later filmed for Showtime as My Own Country directed by Mira Nair. As his interest in writing grew, he took time off from medicine to study at the Iowa Writers Workshop where he earned an MFA in 1991. Since then, his work has appeared in various prestigious magazines. His latest book, the bestselling Covenant of Water (2003), has gained global acclaim and was chosen by Oprah Winfrey for her Book Club.
January 6, 2025 ● 4:50 pm
Maps and Stethoscopes : Abraham Verghese on the influences that shaped his writing. In conversation with Sandip Roy
January 10, 2025 ● 3:45 pm
The Covenant of Water : Abraham Verghese discusses his best-selling epic with Malavika Banerjee
Abu Leila is a queer Arab writer and community organiser, interested in the role of literature in social movements. They are a Barbican Young Poet and one of the winners of the 2019 Spread the Word London Writers Awards. Their work, preserving histories of anti-imperialist resistance in South Lebanon, has been shortlisted for the 2024 Wasafiri new writing prize. They have written theatre shows preserving oral family histories of war for the Camden People’s Theatre and the North Wall. They have been commissioned by Poet in the City and anthologised in Bad Betty Press’ field notes on survival and the other side of hope. They are currently writing their first novel, an extract from which won the Bridport Prize’s Peggy Chapman-Andrews First Novel Award 2022. They hope to see the fall of capitalism and imperialism in their lifetime
Ananda Lal, an international authority on Tagore, theatre and translation, retired as Professor of English, Jadavpur University. He directs Writers Workshop, India’s oldest continuing publisher of Indian creative writing in English, succeeding his father P. Lal in 2010. He also runs kolkatatheatre.com, a guide to theatre in Kolkata. His most important publications include Rabindranath Tagore: Three Plays, The Oxford Companion to Indian Theatre, Indian Drama in English: The Beginnings, Utpal Dutt’s Barricade (translated with an introduction), and the research-based CD The Voice of Rabindranath Tagore. He was theatre critic of The Telegraph from 1986 to 2018 and of The Times of India from 2018 to 2020, reviewing over 3000 productions. Once a DJ for Yuvavani (All India Radio), he has written on the interface between popular Western and Indian music and was a regular columnist on rock and jazz for The Statesman and The Telegraph. He directed theatre productions, including 25 at Jadavpur University where he made it a credit course, and advised such international successes as Shakespeare’s Midsummer Night’s Dream for the British Council. He has a 50-year-old portfolio in television and film as an award-winning scriptwriter, researcher, commentator, narrator and subtitler.
Andaleeb Wajid is a hybrid author having published more than 45 novels in the past 15 years. She enjoys writing in a number of different genres such as young adult (YA), romance and horror. Her YA novel Asmara’s Summer was adapted for screen to become Dil, Dosti, Dilemma on Amazon Prime and other works are in the process of being optioned or adapted. Her YA novel, The Henna Start-up, is the winner of the Neev Literature Festival Award 2024 and Crossword Book Award 2024, along with receiving honourable mention at the BK Awards 2024.
Angela Saini is a journalist and author based in New York. She teaches science writing at MIT and is a Moynihan Public Scholar at the City College of New York. Her work appears regularly in National Geographic, Science and Foreign Policy. Her 2019 book, Superior: The Return of Race Science, was a finalist for the LA Times Book Prize and her latest, The Patriarchs: How Men Came to Rule, was a finalist for the Orwell Prize for Political Writing. She has a Masters in Engineering from the University of Oxford.
January 6, 2025 ● 3:10 pm
Patriarchs : Angela Saini on how men came to rule the world. In conversation with Sumona Chakravarty
January 10, 2025 ● 5:15 pm
The Science in Literature and the Literature in Science Writing : Angela Saini, (TBA), Srijato and Venki Ramakrishnan in conversation with Malavika Banerjee
Anindya Chatterjee is a Bengali singer, writer, lyricist, composer and film director. He is one of the lead singer-composers of the popular Bangla band Chandrabindoo. He is a recipient of the National Award for Best Lyrics for Pherari Mon from Antaheen (with fellow-band member Chandril Bhattacharya) and the Filmfare (East) Best Lyricist Award for the song Raat Jaaye from the film Alik Sukh. Some of his notable books include Niruddesh Somporke Ghoshona, A Kinchit, Bokolosh and Ekdinbyapi. He has directed the films Open Tee Bioscope, Projapoti Biskut, Manojder Adbhut Bari and Prem Tem. He has also acted in the films Durgeshgarer Guptadhan, Shubho Muharat and Satyanweshi.
January 10, 2025 ● 11:15 am
Samay Kothay Je Choley Gelo : Writing in different ages and stages of one’s life. Readings and reflections by Anindya Chatterjee, Anupam Roy and Srijato. In conversation with Roopsha Dasguupta
Anindya Paulchaudhuri is a seasoned Banking and Wealth Management Professional. After working for two decades in senior leadership positions across different MNC Banks (ABN AMRO, Standard Chartered and DBS), he is now partner and Group CEO of WealthApp as an entrepreneur. He is an RK Mission pass-out and did his Executive Management course from IIM Kolkata and IIM Bangalore.
Anirban Bhattacharya is a popular and critically acclaimed stage and screen actor, singer and director. For the film Eagoler Chokh he received the Filmfare Award (East) for Best Actor in a supporting role. He made his directorial debut with the Bengali crime drama web-series Mandaar inspired from William Shakespeare’s Macbeth. He received the Young Artist Scholarship in 2009 from the Cultural Ministry of the Government of India. In 2010, he was selected to work as a full-time professional actor at Minerva, the first State Repertoire in West Bengal. He acted in three eminent productions under Minerva Repertoire and then went on to work as a professional, freelance theatre actor. He continues to work in both film and stage with many eminent directors.
Born in Allahabad, schooled for a time in the UK, Anjana Basu has published 10 novels and three books of poetry including The Chess Players and Other Poems from Writers Workshop. Her first poem was chosen for the Illustrated Weekly by the then Poetry Editor Kamala Das. Her poems have appeared in an anthology brought out by Penguin India. Since then she has featured in Kunapipi, The Blue Moon Review, The Phoenix Review, The Ginosco Review, the Salzburg Review, Prosopisia and Indian Literature, to name a few.. The BBC has broadcast one of her short stories. In 2004, she was awarded a Hawthornden Fellowship in Scotland where she worked on her second novel, Black Tongue,published by Roli in 2007. Her first novel, Curses & Ivory, was published by HarperCollins. She began writing for children in 2010 when Roli brought out Chinku and the Wolfboy. Her Jim Corbett series for TERI dealing with big cat conservation for children began in 2013 with In the Shadow of the Leaves followed by Leopard in the Laboratory, Eighteen Tides and a Tiger, Hide & Seek Tiger and Lockdown Tiger. Talking Cub brought out Grandfather’s Tiger Tales in 2022. Her book, Translating for Rituparno,was published by JU Press in 2024. She lives and works as an advertising consultant in Calcutta.
January 6, 2025 ● 4:00 pm
Acts of God : Kanan Gill discusses his debut book. In conversation with Ankita Mukherji
Anuja Chauhan worked in advertising for over 17 years and is credited with many popular campaigns including PepsiCo’s Nothing Official About It, Yeh Dil Maange More, Mera Number Kab Aayega, Oye Bubbly and Darr ke Aage Jeet Hai. She is the author of several bestselling novels such as The Zoya Factor, Battle for Bittora, Those Pricey Thakur Girls, The House that BJ Built, Baaz and Club You to Death, the screen rights for all of which have been acquired by major Bombay studios. Her seventh novel, The Fast and the Dead, came out in 2023.
Anupam Roy is a well-known and popular Indian singer-songwriter and music director. He has composed, written lyrics and sung for many Bengali films. In 2015, he made his Bollywood debut with the film Piku for which he won a Filmfare Award for best background score. Winner of four Filmfare Awards, he has also received a National Film Award for Best Lyrics for the song Tumi Jake Bhalobasho from the film Praktan. He is also a prolific writer and has been published in various online and print magazines and newspapers.
January 10, 2025 ● 11:15 am
Samay Kothay Je Choley Gelo : Writing in different ages and stages of one’s life. Readings and reflections by Anindya Chatterjee, Anupam Roy and Srijato. In conversation with Roopsha Dasguupta
January 10, 2025 ● 5:00 pm
Tumi, Ma : Jayasri Burman and Arunava Sinha speak about her book and tryst with art. In conversation with Sujoy Prasad Chatterjee (Introduction by Sunaina Anand)
A software technologist by profession and a researcher of the Indus Script and a poet by addiction, Bahata Ansumali has already published four books of poems – Ṭhung Śabda Halei Kabitā (Aihik Prakaśanī, 2020), Hṛidiśabda Rui Mane Paḍe (Sristiisukh Prakashan, 2022), Rakta Abdi Gaḍate Pāre Nā (Shabda Kalkata Publishing House, 2024), and Megher Kono Pāpabodh Nei (Sristiisukh Prakashan, 2024). She has also been featured in an anthology of Bengali poems translated into Hindi, recognizing significant female poets of the 21st century millennial West Bengal and has represented South Asian contemporary poets on the international platform, Poesia World, in 2021. In the area of Indus Script and Indus Valley civilization’s languages, her fundamental works have been published in an internationally famous Nature Group journal and in proceedings of several national and international seminars and have been acclaimed by renowned linguists, epigraphists and archaeologists.
Balaji Vittal is a National Award-winning and MAMI Award-winning author of Bollywood books, a columnist, podcaster, a TEDx speaker and a Bollywood commentator. He can be reached on X (formerly Twitter) at @vittalbalaji and his website is www.balajivittal.com
January 6, 2025 ● 4:30 pm
Y : A reading of Avik Chanda’s play by Barun Chanda and Vinay Sharma
Bernardine Evaristo won the Booker Prize 2019 with her eighth book, Girl, Woman, Other, the first black woman and black British person to win it. It has sold over a million copies in the English language and been a bestseller in many other languages. The author of essays, journalism, literary criticism, poetry and drama, her other books include the novels Mr Loverman, Blonde Roots, Lara and The Emperor’s Babe and two non-fiction books Manifesto: On Never Giving Up and Look Again: Feminism. Her books have been translated into over 40 languages. She has also set up many inclusion programmes for writers and, since 2020, been the curator of Black Britain: Writing Back for Penguin Random House, re-publishing books from the past. She is the current Literature Mentor for the Rolex Mentor & Protégé Initiative. She has received nearly 80 awards, honours and nominations. She is Professor of Creative Writing at Brunel University London; an Honorary Fellow of St Anne’s College, University of Oxford; an International Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences; President of the Royal Society of Literature and the current President of Rose Bruford College of Theatre and Performance.
January 6, 2025 ● 4:00 pm
Inauguration by the Guest of Honor, Bernardine Evaristo : (Winner of the 2019 Booker Prize for her novel: Girl, Woman, Other)
January 10, 2025 ● 12:10 pm
The Evaristo Manifesto : Bernardine Evaristo’s guidelines for a life in literature. In conversation with Shahana Chatterjee
Biswajit Ray is an Associate Professor of Bengali from Visva-Bharati, Shantiniketan. His publications on Rabindranath Tagore include Sachalatar Gan, Rabindranath O Vivekananda: Swadeshe Samakale and Rabindranath and His Times (Cambridge Companion to Rabindranath Tagore). A well-known columnist, he writes regularly for Anandabazar Patrika about various socio-cultural aspects of Bengali life. He received the Rupali Sahitya Samman in 2017 and the Nilanjana Sen Smriti Puraskar in 2019.
Chandril Bhattacharya is a popular Bengali columnist, lyricist, poet, singer and director. He is one of the main lyricists of the Bengali band Chandrabindoo and occasionally sings for them. He has written 13 books and directed four short films. Together with Anindya Chatterjee, he won the 2010 National Film Award for Best Lyrics for the song Pherari Mon from the film Antaheen. His Uttam Madhyam columns for Anandabazar Patrika were compiled in a book. Later, he began to air his views in the weekly Robbar Pratidin in a column titled Du Chhokka Pnaach. His satirical perspective addresses cultural phenomena, national and international current affairs, human psychology and social norms. He coins peculiar idioms, playful jargon, spoonerisms and reconstructs colloquial Bengali phrases and expressions to formulate absurdist humorous puns in most of his articles
Chinmoy Guha is Professor of English and Former Head, Department of English, at the University of Calcutta. He has also been the Vice-Chancellor of Rabindra Bharati University, Kolkata, and the Director of Publications, Embassy of France in India in New Delhi. A leading essayist in Bengali and a distinguished translator of French literature, he was the editor of book reviews of the Bengali literary magazines, Desh and Boier Desh. His latest works include two new collections of essays in Bengali (Chilekothhar Unmadini and Garho Shankher Khonje), The Tower and the Sea, Romain Rolland-Kalidas Nag Correspondence and two new anthologies of 20th century French poetry. He is the recipient of several prestigious awards including the Knighthood of Academic Palms from France.
January 6, 2025 ● 3:00 pm
At The Breakfast Table : Defne Suman discusses her novel and a muse called Istanbul. In conversation with Chinmoy Guha
Claire Betita de Guzman is a Filipina writer based in Singapore and author of four novels – Miss Makeover,Budget is the New Black,Girl Meets Worldand No Boyfriend Since Birth, which was adapted into a TV series in the Philippines. A former journalist, she started out as a lifestyle reporter for the broadsheet TODAY before working as a lifestyle editor for international and local magazines, including Cosmopolitan Philippines and Harper’s Bazaar Singapore. Having travelled extensively to 51 countries, she founded Words and Wanderlust, a series of creative writing retreats held in beautiful, inspiring locations around the world. She has led talks, workshops and panels at literary events in Southeast Asia including the Singapore Writers Festival and Poetry Festival Singapore. She is co-author of a poetry collection, Dreaming of the Divine Downstairs and co-editor of Get Luckier, an anthology of Philippine-Singapore writings. Her latest novel, Sudden Superstar, by Penguin Random House SEA, is forthcoming.
Dan Morrison’s writing on science, culture and conflict has appeared in the New York Times, National Geographic and Artforum. He was at Newsday’s New York City edition for seven years covering the bombast of the Rudolph Giuliani era. He later moved to South Asia where his topics ranged from militancy in Pakistan and Afghanistan to the dying art of the hand-painted Bollywood movie poster. He reported from Egypt, Sudan, Uganda and Libya between 2005 and 2008 covering the conflict in Darfur, the looming struggle for oil in southern Sudan, Libya’s bizarre attempt at glasnost and the effects of climate change on the Nile ecosystem. During this time, he traveled down the length of the White Nile, from Lake Victoria to the Mediterranean Sea, through the entirety of Uganda, Sudan and Egypt. That six-month journey was the basis for his first book, The Black Nile. He is also the author of The Poisoner of Bengal, the true story of a murder by plague in Jazz Age Calcutta
Dayanita Singh uses photography to reflect and expand on the ways in which we relate to images. Stemming from her interest in the archive, the museums present her photographs as interconnected bodies of work that are replete with both poetic and narrative possibilities. She has continued to reconceptualise architecture in a new series of Montages, which seamlessly splice together images from diverse spaces to create phantastic yet plausible settings. Publishing is also a significant part of the artist’s practice which is often published without text. She says, ‘the book is at the heart of my work. To me, the exhibition is the catalogue of the works in the book’.
January 6, 2025 ● 6:30 pm
The Zakir Hussain Maquette : Dayanita Singh talks about her book, the art and how they segue into each other. Presentation followed by conversation with Malavika Banerjee
Debarati Mukhopadhyay is a celebrated author of contemporary Bengali literature and an eloquent TEDx speaker. She has over 30 bestselling novels to her name, published by leading houses in India and abroad. Along with her Government Officer profession, her contributions to literature have earned her prestigious accolades,including the Indian Express Devi Award, Shailajananda Puraskar and Tagore Samman. Several of her novels like Shikhandi, Shastri, Swastik Sanket and Troilokko have been adapted for cinema and OTT platforms. She also contributes to Bengal’s foremost literary magazines and journals. Beyond her literary achievements, her journey is a story of resilience and inspiration. Born and raised in rural India, she has risen to prominence through sheer determination and talent. Her life took a challenging turn when she battled Guillain-Barré Syndrome, a life-threatening neuro disease that left her on ventilation for weeks. Yet, her strength and indomitable spirit saw her overcome the odds, making her journey all the more remarkable.
Defne Suman was born in Istanbul and grew up on Büyükada. She gained a Masters in Sociology from the Boğaziçi University and then worked as a teacher in Thailand and Laos, where she studied Hatha Yoga and stayed in Buddhist monasteries. She later continued her studies in Oregon, USA, and now lives in Athens with her husband. Her novels and award-winning short stories have been translated into many languages including English and are available all around the world.
January 6, 2025 ● 3:00 pm
At The Breakfast Table : Defne Suman discusses her novel and a muse called Istanbul. In conversation with Chinmoy Guha
January 10, 2025 ● 1:00 pm
Destiny’s Daughters : Defne Suman and Saras Manickam discuss how secrets and shadows of history make the women in their stories. In conversation with Antara Dutta
Dhritiman Chatterjee began his acting career in 1970 as the protagonist of Satyajit Ray’s Pratidwandi (The Adversary). Most of his work has been in India’s independent cinema with filmmakers like Satyajit Ray, Mrinal Sen and Aparna Sen, among others. In recent years, he has worked in films with directors as diverse as Deepa Mehta, Jane Campion, Sanjay Leela Bhanali and Mani Ratnam. He has received several acting awards in India and been on the jury of the Indian National Film Awards committee. He has also been active in English theatre in Chennai and pursued a parallel career in advertising, social communications and documentary filmmaking.
Francesc Miralles is an award-winning and internationally bestselling author of books about how to live well, together with the novels Love in Small Letter and Wabi-Sabi. Alongside Hector Garcia, he was welcomed to Okinawa in Japan where the inhabitants live for longer than in any other place in the world. There they had the chance to interview more than a hundred villagers about their philosophy for a long and happy life. This led to co-authoring the multimillion-copy international bestseller Ikigai: The Japanese Secret to a Long and Happy Life as well as The Book of Ichigo Ichie: The Art of Making the Most of Every Moment, the Japanese Way. Their latest book is The Four-Way Path: A Guide to Purushartha and India’s Spiritual Traditions for a Life of Happiness, Success, and Purpose. Their books have been published in more than sixty languages.
January 6, 2025 ● 5:00 pm
Ikigai : Francesc Miralles on his iconic book, Ikigai, and why it resonates with the youth across the globe. In conversation with Ruchira Das
January 10, 2025 ● 3:00 pm
The Four Purusharthas : Francesc Miralles discusses his new book. In conversation with Mitakshara Kumari
Georgina Godwin is an honorary fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. She is a broadcast journalist and presents the author interview programme ‘Meet the Writers’ and the current affairs show ‘The Globalist’ on Monocle Radio. She’s also Books Editor for the station and chairs literary events worldwide. She was a founder member of Zimbabwe’s first independent radio station before being declared an ‘Enemy of the State’ and exiled to London. She is on the board of the charity English PEN.
Harpreet is a versatile artiste, who sings original musical compositions in Hindi as well as in regional Indian languages and dialects such as Punjabi, Bengali, Assamese, Rajasthani and Haryanvi. He is best known for creating musical scores to epic works of humanist poets like Kabir and Bulleh Shah. Credited for taking celebrated poets to the masses, he has also composed popular hummable tunes to words of poets such as Pash (Avtar Singh Sandhu), Faiz Ahmad Faiz and Nirala (Suryakant Tripathi). The rhythmic blend of soulful poetry to the pulsating sound of guitar and percussion are at once unique and innovative, familiar and foreign. He has performed at many prestigious festivals across India and abroad.
January 6, 2025 ● 8:00 pm
Bullhe Shah’s Sufiyana - A Murty Classics Presentation : A Musical Performance by Harpreet based on Bullhe Shah's Sufi lyrics from Murty Classical Library of India
Hector Garcia is a citizen of Japan, where he has lived for over a decade, and of Spain, where he was born. He is the author of several books about Japanese culture including two worldwide bestsellers, A Geek in Japan and Ikigai. A former software engineer, he worked at CERN in Switzerland before moving to Japan.
Ida Jo Pajunen is a writer and artist. She completed her Master’s degree in Gender Studies from the University of Cambridge and another Master’s degree in traditions of yoga and meditation from the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London. She was awarded the title of Yoga Acharya by the Sivananda Yoga Vedanta Centre. She is the co-author of several Ghosh Yoga Practice Manuals and has edited and published historic manuscripts. She makes her home in Minnesota, USA but travels all over the world to teach practical yoga, history and philosophy and to perform music. She is a lifelong and award-winning violinist and vocalist.
Jack Sim is the founder of the Restroom Association of Singapore, the World Toilet Organization, the World Toilet Day initiative and Bottom of the Pyramid Hub. Formerly from the construction industry, he decided to devote the rest of his life to social work after attaining financial independence at the age of 40. Born in a slum in Singapore in 1957, he learned entrepreneurship and gumption from his uneducated mother who started a series of small businesses. In 2001, he received the Schwab Foundation award for Social Entrepreneur of the Year. In 2007, he was elected a Fellow of Ashoka: Innovators for the Public and also became one of the key members to convene the Sustainable Sanitation Alliance composed of key players in the sanitation space. He was also named one of the Heroes of the Environment for 2008 by Time magazine. His book The Gumption of Mr Toilet: Mobilizing the World to Effect Change was published by Penguin in August 2024.
Janet Gasper Chowdhury is a self-proclaimed ‘kaleidoscope’, a cool mom to two independent-minded teenagers and a demanding professional to a high performing team. She, along with her husband, leads an organisation that runs ICSE and CBSE co-ed schools educating over 6500 students as well as a free evening school for underprivileged girl students. She enjoys designing interiors, writing poetry and challenging herself with golf, badminton and recently by playing cricket. With little or no exposure to Hindu mythology while growing up, Amish’s Shiva Trilogy opened up a new world for her and she’s been a fan ever since.
Jashodhara Chakraborti is an alumna of Lady Shri Ram College and IIM Calcutta. She writes, translates and teaches a course on storytelling. She is the author of two books of The Wordkeepers Trilogy – The Wordkeepers and Skyserpents – the first, a bestseller on debut. She has been a columnist on Scroll.in. In 2019, she created a concept and Bible for a web series with Disney+ Hotstar. She has serialized a translation of Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore’s opera, The Illusion Game, on the digital platform, Scrollstack. Her translation of Hemendra Kumar Roy’s iconic adventure, Jawker Dhawn, was published as The Treasure Of The Khasi Hills by Talking Cub Books in 2023.
Jayanta Sengupta is the Director of the Alipore Museum in Kolkata and the former Director of Victoria Memorial Hall, Kolkata. He taught History at Jadavpur University and previously at the University of Notre Dame. He is the author of At the Margins: Discourses of Development, Democracy and Regionalism in Orissa (2015), Those Noble Edifices: The Raj Bhavans of Bengal (Victoria Memorial Hall, 2019) and two books in Bengali named Itihas o Samosomoy: Samaj, Sanskriti, Rajniti (2022) and Hensheldarpan: Bangalir Hanrir Khobor (2023). He has also co-edited The Long History of Partition in Bengal: Event, Memory, Representations (2024).
January 6, 2025 ● 4:00 pm
Acts of God : Kanan Gill discusses his debut book. In conversation with Ankita Mukherji
Koral Dasgupta is an accomplished author and content curator with over 20 years of experience. Her diverse work spans academic non-fiction to relationship dramas, focusing on gender narratives and complex human emotions. She founded www.tellmeyourstory.biz, a platform that uses literature to inspire social engagement and drive behavioral change for inclusion and diversity. She designs and executes learning programs, conducts writing workshops and curates content for events focused on gender and mythology. She has also been an advisory member of the Central Board for Film Certification. She has released her five-bookSati series – a retelling of the stories of the Pancha Kanya from Indian mythology. Her notable achievements include being shortlisted for the Sahitya Academy Awards in 2023, securing a five-book contract with Pan Macmillan and cataloging her books in prestigious libraries including the University of Harvard and Columbia University.
January 10, 2025 ● 12:10 pm
Tara and Devadasi : Sangeeta Bahadur and Koral Dasgupta discuss the women of myth and fantasy. In conversation with (TBA)
Krishnan Srinivasan is a retired Indian diplomat, historian, author, former Indian Foreign Secretary and Deputy Secretary-General of the Commonwealth of Nations. Educated at Christ Church, Oxford, he has been India’s Ambassador/High Commissioner to Zambia, Botswana, Nigeria, Benin, Cameroon, The Netherlands and Bangladesh. He is a regular columnist and book reviewer and has written books on world politics and detective novels. His articles appear in leading newspapers and periodicals. Among many prestigious honours, he has been a member of Christ Church, Oxford’s Senior Common Room and High Table from 1998 to 2016; Fellow of Wolfson College, Cambridge (2002–05); Fellow of the Centre for International Studies Cambridge (2002–05); Fellow of the Institute of Commonwealth Studies London (2002–08); Fellow of the Netherlands Institute of Advanced Studies (2003–04); Fellow of the Maulana Abul Kalam Azad Institute of Asian Studies, Kolkata from 2006 to 2015; and Fellow of the Swedish Collegium for Advanced Study at Uppsala in 2008 and 2012–13. He was made a Chevalier de l’Ordre de la Valeur (Cameroon) in 2007.
American-born Lee Durrell received a PhD in Zoology from Duke University. She married Gerald Durrell in 1979 and spent 15 years with him writing and making television programmes about natural history and conservation. She became involved with the conservation work of the Durrel Wildlife Conservation Trust, of which she is the Honorary Director, and was instrumental in re-opening Madagascar to western scientists during the early 1980’s. Her first book, The State of the Ark, was a comprehensive review of species conservation published in 1986. She maintains a deep interest in her late husband’s legacy, receiving the MBE for services to conservation in 2011. This year marks the centenary of Gerald Durrell.
Dr. Lopamudra Maitra is an anthropologist, author and international columnist. She teaches and researches in areas of history, popular culture and narratives of India and South Asia. She has represented India at various prestigious seminars and conferences abroad including UNESCO conferences on Intangible Cultural Heritage. Apart from her academic endeavours, she loves to write about oral narratives (folklore, mythology and historiography). Through her work, she likes to explore voices that often lie in obscurity echoing the lesser-known aspects of our heritage and the continuous dialogue between man and nature. She is the author of six books including The Owl Delivered the Good News All Night Long: Folktales, Legends and Modern Lores of India; How the World was Born: Wondrous Indian Myths and Legends and Collected Works of Upendrakishore Ray Chowdhury.
In her day job, Madhurima Vidyarthi is an endocrinologist, trained in Kolkata and London and a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians (UK). She works in the field of adult endocrinology, with a special interest in the endocrinology of fertility and pregnancy. She has also always been a passionately committed writer. Over the years she has written in many formats including articles for The Statesman and scripts for educational documentaries and for a CD-ROM created by Price Waterhouse Coopers on Satyajit Ray narrated by Sir Richard Attenborough. But her enduring love has always been fiction. She writes across a range of genres and age groups. Her latest release is The School for Bad Girls, a fictionalised telling of the women’s emancipation and education movement in India featuring Kadambini Ganguly, the first woman to train as a doctor in India. An upcoming historical novel for adults is slated to be released in January 2025 by Niyogi Books. She is also part of the Italian Consulate initiative Bridge of Stories, an anthology of short fiction by Indian and Italian writers. She has written for The Woman Inc. and Saaranga Magazine, among others.
Manu S Pillai is a historian and the author of five books, most recently Gods, Guns & Missionaries: The Making of the Modern Hindu Identity. His debut book, The Ivory Throne: Chronicles of the House of Travancore, earned him the Sahitya Akademi Yuva Puraskar. His second work, Rebel Sultans, narrates the story of the late medieval Deccan over four centuries. The Courtesan, the Mahatma and the Italian Brahmin, published in 2019, is a collection of his historical anecdotes originally published as columns in various newspapers. He is currently a columnist at Mint Lounge. He holds a PhD in History from King’s College London.
January 10, 2025 ● 1:00 pm
Gods, Guns and Missionaries : Manu S. Pillai on his new book. In conversation with Sujaan Mukherjee
Monideepa Banerjie is a Kolkata-based journalist reporting on contemporary politics in West Bengal. She is, in fact, the most familiar face of Kolkata on National TV, having covered everything east for India’s premier news channel NDTV for the last twenty-eight years. She began her career with The Telegraph, was one of the earliest journalists in the country to transition to television and is a Chevening Scholar (1997) and a Fulbright Fellow (2001). She remains a newshound today, working independently across platforms and watching the media in India march to drum beats that have certainly changed since she joined the profession forty years ago!
January 10, 2025 ● 11:15 am
Khaki Lines and Steel Frames : Rajesh Patil and Veena Raman discuss chronicles of police and bureaucratic life. In conversation with Mrityunjay Singh
Nayantara Violet Alva graduated from Ashoka University with a Bachelors in Political Science in 2019. Since then she’s worked in the television and OTT space as a creative producer in Mumbai. At Disney-Star she was a Senior Producer on several primetime Star Plus shows, including the massive hit Anupama for its first 850 episodes. Currently she works at Viacom18, producing and developing original web series for JioCinema across genres. The TV and AVOD formats attract her for their unprecedented wide reach and accessibility and she draws from her experience with it heavily in her snappy writing. Inspired by events during her own college life, her debut novel, Liberal Hearts,was published by Penguin in October 2024 and dives deep into the angst and anxieties of GenZ in India through witty and accessible form.
Neelum Saran Gour is a well-known writer of Indian fiction in English. She has authored six novels, four short story collections and two books of non-fiction. She has also been a columnist and book reviewer. She has translated her work into Hindi. Her creative work has been published by Penguin, Harper Collins, Rupa and Marg Publications and her critical work has been published by Routledge, Sahitya Akademi, Pencraft and other prestigious publishing houses. Many research articles on her work have appeared in journals of foreign and Indian institutions. She has been on writers’ fellowships in England, Scotland and Spain. Her most recent novel, Requiem In Raga Janki, based on the life of the famous Allahabad singer, Janki Bai, won the coveted Hindu Fiction Prize for 2018 and subsequently the Sahitya Akademi Award 2023. Her major contribution is the exploration of the culture, history and character of the city of Allahabad. She taught English Literature at the University of Allahabad for 44 years. Presently, after retiring, she continues to work on her newest project, a novel.
Nirupama Kotru is an officer of the Indian Revenue Service(Income Tax) of the 1992 batch.She has worked in various roles in the Income Tax Department at Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai and Pune which include the International Taxation wing and also the Income Tax Tribunal and Settlement Commission. She was on deputation to the Central Government from October 2009 to January 2012 in the Ministry of Corporate Affairs where she was responsible for various e-governance initiatives of the Corporate Affairs Ministry including the award winning MCA21 corporate filing portal. She was part of the team that set up the Indian Institute of Corporate Affairs at Manesar and helped develop competition policy as well as guidelines for corporate governance and corporate social responsibility. From February 2012 to January 2015, she was posted as Director (Films) in the Ministry of Information & Broadcasting, Government of India, where she looked after the administration of media units such as NFDC, Films Division and Children’s Film Society of India, promoted Indian films at film festivals in India and abroad, administered film institutes at Pune (FTII) and Kolkata (SRFTI) and shaped film censorship and archival policy. She also drove initiatives such as setting up of a single window clearance for film shooting as well as an institute of excellence in gaming, animation and VFX. From May 2018 to May 2021, she was posted as Joint Secretary in the Ministry of Culture, Government of India, where she nurtured prestigious national academies of literature, music, dance and drama such as Sahitya Akademi, National School of Drama, Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts, Sangeet Natak Akademi and Lalit Kala Akademi and iconic museums such as Victoria Memorial and Indian Museum at Kolkata and National Museum, National Gallery of Modern Art at Delhi. She also looked after Gandhi Smriti & Darshan Society, UNESCO matters, International Cultural Relations, Commemorations & Cultural Mapping. She is presently posted in the Ministry of Coal as Joint Secretary & Financial Advisor with additional charges of Ministry of Mines and Minority Affairs. Her interests include writing short stories and poems in English and Hindi and articles on cinema, parenting and other topics. She is also a singer. She has co-edited an anthology on Hindi cinema of the 1970s called The Swinging Seventies.
Novoneel Chakraborty is the bestselling author of 14 thriller novels and one short story collection titled Cheaters. His Forever series was in the bestseller list for ten weeks straight after its release with Forever Is A Lie featuring in the highest selling books on Flipkart for 2017. Forever Is True made it to Amazon’s Memorable Books of 2017 and Times of India’s Most Stunning Books of 2017. Known for his twists, dark plots and strong female protagonists, he has been called the Sidney Sheldon of India by his readers. His immensely popular thriller series, The Stranger Trilogy, has been translated into six Indian languages and adapted into a web series, Hello Mini. His erotic thriller novel, Black Suits You, has been adapted into the hit Bekaaboo, while his exclusive digital novella, Red Suits You, is also being adapted into a web series. Apart from novels, he has written and developed several TV and web shows for premiere channels and platforms.
After graduating from the London School of Economics with a law degree and later called to the Bar in the UK and Malaysia, Ong Chin Huat studied History of Art at the British Institute of Florence, Italy. He became the first Chinese person to work in the editorial department at Hong Kong Tatler as the Social Editor. He started his own PR consultancy specializing in fashion and luxury goods. Currently, he is a freelance writer, fashion stylist, and TV host. He has met and interviewed everyone from movie stars and business tycoons to politicians and world-class athletes.
Parth Rahatekar is a poet and writer from Pune, currently based in Melbourne. Their work interrogates systems of violence and creates worlds of vibrancy, love and healing. His poems have featured across stages, galleries and publications in India and the world including the ISCP, New York, The narrm ngarrgu Library, The Brighton Centre of Contemporary Art, Vogue India and ASAP Art, amongst others. Their debut collection, Midnights, Parth’s Version, toured across venues in India and Melbourne. Currently, they are tinkering with various revelations while pursuing a Master’s in publishing.
Payal Kapadia loves words for the stories they tell, even more for the stories they carry inside them. She studied English Literature at St Xavier’s College, Mumbai, and earned an M.Sc. degree (Journalism) from Northwestern University. Writing for news outlets in the United States, Hong Kong, Japan and India, she was drawn to offbeat tales of unsung heroes and lost causes – an art-inclined elephant, the last Japanese soldiers of Subhas Chandra Bose’s Indian National Army and historic homes going under the hammer. Her debut novella, Wisha Wozzariter, won the 2013 Crossword Book Award for Children’s Writing and is in the 101 Indian Children’s Books We Love! compilation. Her best-selling books include the well-loved Horrid High series, a children’s biography of B.R. Ambedkar, Twice Upon a Time and Maidless in Mumbai.
Peter Godwin was born and raised in Zimbabwe. After working as a human rights lawyer and a foreign correspondent for the Sunday Times and the BBC, he has authored six non-fiction books including Mukiwa, which won the George Orwell Prize and the Esquire-Apple-Waterstones Award, and When a Crocodile Eats the Sun, which won the Borders Original Voices Award. His book, The Fear, was selected by the New Yorker as a Best Book of the Year. He has taught writing at Wesleyan and Columbia and served as President of the PEN American Center. His latest book is Exit Wounds: A Story of Love, Loss and Occasional Wars.
Poulami Chatterjee Bose is an actor, theatre director, dancer, choreographer and the Artistic Director of her theatre group Mukhomukhi. She started her acting career under Utpal Dutt and has worked in many plays under the direction of her father, Late Soumitra Chatterjee. She has also worked with other directors including Suman Mukhopadhyay, Biplab Bandyopadhyay, Abanti Chakraborty and Dwijen Banerjee. She has choreographed, directed, and performed in a dance-theatre production Kaalmrigaya. She also directed and acted as the lead in Phera, which was selected for the 8th Theatre Olympics hosted by NSD in 2018. Her other acting and directorial credits include Ghotok Bidaii, Duti Kapurusher Katha, Andha Yug and Typist. She directed and performed a solo piece in English called Of Mothers and Sons in 2022. In 2023, she directed Janmantar written by her father. She also runs her own dance institute Aanarto. She received the Rama Prasad Banik Purashkar and Shyamal Sen Smriti Purashkar for the play Supari Killer.
January 10, 2025 ● 2:30 pm
Soumitra Chatterjee and His World : Sanghamitra Chakraborty discusses her book on the thespian with Poulami Chatterjee Bose. In conversation with Priyadarshinee Guha
Prayaag Akbar is a novelist and journalist. He has written for publications including The Indian Express and Caravan, covering issues of caste, class, and politics. He is the author of the novels Mother India (2024) and Leila (2017). Leila won the Crossword Jury Prize and the Tata Literature First Book Award. The book was translated into multiple languages and was the basis of a popular Netflix series. He teaches creative writing at Krea University.
An alumna of Loreto House, La Martiniere for Girls and Presidency College, Priyadarshinee Guha is a Masters in Modern History and a gold medallist from Calcutta University. Passionate about teaching she chose to make this her life force. She has been teaching History and English for the last 28 years in reputed schools of Kolkata, namely Modern High School for Girls and The Heritage School. As a teacher of History, she has conducted several workshops for students and for training of teachers in using novel and creative approaches in the classroom. A trained Rabindra Sangeet singer, she has worked for several years in a reputed Bengali theatre group in Calcutta. Theatre was carried into the classroom which led her to mount several award-winning productions under her direction. She has also directed water ballets set to Tagorean themes. Presently the Vice-President at the Kolkata Centre for Creativity, she is carrying on her mission of marrying the arts with education.
When not immersed in writing about the worlds of Hollywood, Bollywood and streaming, Priyanka Roy will be found planning a holiday or dreaming of a spa day. Assistant Editor (Films) with The Telegraph t2, she loves a good conversation on cinema and enjoys critiquing films, good, bad and ugly.
January 6, 2025 ● 2:15 pm
Seeding A New Cinema - The Legacy of Shyam Benegal : Shabana Azmi and Rajit Kapur discuss the impact of the filmmaker on the country’s cinema. In conversation with Priyanka Roy
Rajat Chaudhuri is the author of acclaimed climate novels The Butterfly Effect and Spellcasters and short story collections Hotel Calcutta and Calculus. He edited The Best Asian Speculative Fiction anthology and co-edited two international collections of solarpunk stories including the bestselling Multispecies Cities – Solarpunk Urban Futures. His translated works include Calcutta Nights based on Hemendra Kumar Roy’s gothic memoir Raater Kolkata and a collection featuring hundred poems by ten emerging Bengali poets. A British Council-Charles Wallace Fellow and Hawthornden Castle Fellow, he is closely involved with the climate movement and writes and speaks frequently about climate, literature and possible futures in local and global venues. Trained in Economics, he has been a contributor to the UNDP Human Development Report and has represented civil society organisations at the United Nations. He has also contributed narratives for the internationally acclaimed climate video game Survive the Century. His book of cautionary and redemptive stories of climate change for young adults, Wonder Tales for a Warming Planet, appeared this month.
Rajdeep Sardesai is an award-winning senior journalist, author and TV news presenter. Currently the consulting editor and lead news anchor of the India Today Group, he has over three decades of journalistic experience in print and television. He was the founder–editor of the IBN 18 network and before that was the managing editor of NDTV 24X7 and NDTV India. He has won more than 50 awards for journalistic excellence. His previous books on the Indian elections, 2019: How Modi Won India and 2014: The Election That Changed India, have been national bestsellers. He is also the author of Democracy’s XI: The Great Indian Cricket Story. His latest book, 2024: The Election That Surprised India, brings to life the inside story of the recent exciting period in Indian politics and society.
January 10, 2025 ● 11:15 am
Khaki Lines and Steel Frames : Rajesh Patil and Veena Raman discuss chronicles of police and bureaucratic life. In conversation with Mrityunjay Singh
Rajit Kapur is a well-known actor, producer and director. He made his debut on stage in 1978. His theatre credits include Love Letters, Class of 84, solo performance of Girish Karnad’s Flowers, A Walk in the Woods, Siddhus of Upper Juhu, Twelve Angry Jurors and recently, Mosambi Narangi. He has donned the Director’s hat for many plays including The Glass Menagerie, Mahua and Naqqaash (Hindi). He is also a Co-founder of Rage Productions. His television breakthrough came with a role in the teleserial Ghar Jamai in 1986. He is currently playing the title role of Sardar Patel on Doorshan in a series named Sardar – The Game Changer. His popularity soared with Basu Chatterjee’s Byomkesh Bakshi in 1991-92. His silver screen debut was in Suraj Ka Satvan Ghoda directed by Shyam Benegal in 1993. His other 75 film credits include Ghulam, Guzaarish, Raazi and Uri. Notable webseries where he has acted are Mithiya 1 & 2 and Rocket Boys. His performance as Mahatma Gandhi in Shyam Benegal’s The Making of the Mahatma fetched him the National Award for Best Actor in 1995.
January 6, 2025 ● 2:15 pm
Seeding A New Cinema - The Legacy of Shyam Benegal : Shabana Azmi and Rajit Kapur discuss the impact of the filmmaker on the country’s cinema. In conversation with Priyanka Roy
Ray Vincent-Mills is a poet, performer, facilitator, organiser and eavesdropper based in Birmingham. Black, trans, queer and fortunate he is interested in provoking discomfort in audiences and himself with his work. Themes include identity, the body, food and links between consumption and perception. He has performed in bars, cafes, restaurants, theatres, streets, a bathroom, a barn, a kitchen and once outside a Tesco (express) because a man asked very nicely. It is endlessly inspired by the Birmingham art scene, hip hop, his chosen family and desserts. He is claiming this is the year of being a baby at things which has manifested in papermaking, experiments with performance art and conquering his fear of deep frying. A member of the Roundhouse collective, it is currently working on a participatory performance piece, THE EXAM by THE ARTIST, supported by multiverse Eastside projects.
Riksundar Banerjee is a distinguished scholar, author, and filmmaker with a deep interest in the intersection of folklore, literature and the supernatural. With an MA in Bengali from Jadavpur University, he pursued a Ph.D. focused on Ghosts in Literature: Traditions and Evolution. He is the author of several critically acclaimed books including Haunted Places of India and The Book of Indian Ghosts. His other works such as Ashoriri Ovidhan and Cholar Pother Khorkuto delve into Bengali literary traditions and folklore. His collection, Chhayashorir: Sekal Ekaler Bhoot er Golper Sonkolon, gathers ghost stories from different historical periods. He is also an active contributor to the field of cinema, having worked as the script and screenplay writer for the feature film BhotBhoti. He has written and directed the short film Golpo Na and was the associate director and writer for Stuck. An engaged academic, he has presented papers on Ghosts in Machines and Technology at the University of York, UK. Currently, he is working on an upcoming jointly edited book with University of Wales Press.
Roopsha Dasguupta is an eminent radio professional, columnist, author, actor and voiceover artist. She has more than 20 years of work experience. In the past, she had been an RJ (Radio Mirchi), Regional Head (Red FM), Director (Aamar FM) and Consultant to Spice FM (Bangladesh). In her extensive radio career she has interviewed many outstanding luminaries including Nobel laureate Amartya Sen, Oscar winner AR Rahman and superstar Amitabh Bachchan. The last concert of Late Manna De at Coffeehouse Kolkata was her brainchild. Her first dubbing assignment for actor Radhika Apte in the National Award-winning Bengali Film Antaheen was highly appreciated. She continues as a voice artist for many renowned advertisements, OTT content (Netflix, Amazon and Hotstar) and podcasts. A visiting faculty for institutes and universities, trainer and writer, she is always a student learning from life every day.
January 10, 2025 ● 11:15 am
Samay Kothay Je Choley Gelo : Writing in different ages and stages of one’s life. Readings and reflections by Anindya Chatterjee, Anupam Roy and Srijato. In conversation with Roopsha Dasguupta
Ruchira Das is an arts leader with 25 years of experience in working on projects in India and internationally. Most recently she worked as Artistic Director at Arthshila where she oversaw programming of multi arts centres in locations across India. In 2013, she founded ThinkArts to facilitate high quality, transformative arts events for children and young people. She has also been a tutor of Strategic Planning & Financial Management in short courses organised by ARThink South Asia, where she served as the Deputy Director. She is currently Directors Arts India at the British Council.
January 6, 2025 ● 5:00 pm
Ikigai : Francesc Miralles on his iconic book, Ikigai, and why it resonates with the youth across the globe. In conversation with Ruchira Das
Rupak Neogy is a visualizer and illustrator and works in the field of branding and communications. Born and brought up in Chandannagar, a historical city in West Bengal, he is a self-taught artist with a deep passion for all things creative. His explorations within the world of art led him to his current profession of art director in advertising. He is also an illustrator in his spare time, and he has illustrated multiple Bengali and English books over the years. His latest books are Kites Fly Highest in The Mountains, The Great Toy Debate, Why Can’t Elephants Be Red? and We Live Here, You Know.
Saharu Nusaiba Kannanari is a writer based out of Kerala. His first novel, Chronicle of an Hour and a Half, published earlier in 2024 won the Crossword Book Award and Atta Galatta Bangalore Literature Festival Book Prize in the fiction category. The book was also shortlisted for the JCB Prize for Literature and Godrej-Mumbai Lit Live! Literary Award. His next book, The Menon Investigation, is scheduled for publication in 2025.
Founded in 2019, Samuho is a collective of storytellers, performers, writers, scholars, painters and musicians. It is a congregation of women and queer artists with a few male associates. The collective aims to feature untold and unheard-of marginalized narratives in their work. They emphasize on making theatre accessible for rural and subaltern communities across West Bengal who, otherwise, cannot access theatre due to financial or class barriers. The collective maintains a non-hierarchal functioning model within the group. To develop their skills, creative practice, and political understanding, Samuho runs year-long capacity-building workshops and training programs for its members and interested people. As a women and queer collective, their journey continues to have many challenges. The collective participates in regular awareness campaigning against sexual harassment, gender crime, and domestic violence and for the equity, equality, and inclusivity of all genders. Their production ATHO HIDIMBA KOTHA has been performed all over West Bengal and in many prestigious festivals to great popular and critical acclaim.
January 10, 2025 ● 7:30 pm
ATHO HIDIMBA KOTHA : A play by Samuho, directed by Titas Dutta
Sandip Roy is a podcaster and columnist living in Kolkata. He hosts The Sandip Roy Show for Indian Express. His dispatches air every week on public radio KALW in San Francisco and his columns appear in Mint Lounge, The Hindu and The Times of India. He is the author of the novel Don’t Let Him Know.
January 6, 2025 ● 4:50 pm
Maps and Stethoscopes : Abraham Verghese on the influences that shaped his writing. In conversation with Sandip Roy
January 10, 2025 ● 12:10 pm
Tara and Devadasi : Sangeeta Bahadur and Koral Dasgupta discuss the women of myth and fantasy. In conversation with (TBA)
January 10, 2025 ● 2:30 pm
Soumitra Chatterjee and His World : Sanghamitra Chakraborty discusses her book on the thespian with Poulami Chatterjee Bose. In conversation with Priyadarshinee Guha
Sara is a 26-year-old writer-poet from the riverside town of Goalpara, India. Their work centres around queerness, faith, memory, language and geo-political marginalizations via poetry, prose and other artistic mediums and has been published in national-level poetry magazines and books. They have been a spoken word artist since 2017 and also a 2024 fellow of ‘The Queer Writers’ Room’ by The Queer Muslim Project. Most recently, two of their works were published in Riverside Stories, a feminist anthology from Assam, by Zubaan books. Being a literature and film major, they also work with translation and film theory and have had academic publications around the same.
Saras Manickam worked as a teacher, teacher-trainer, copywriter, Business English trainer, copy editor and writer of textbooks, school workbooks and coffee-table book while writing short stories at night. Her various work experiences enabled insights into characters and life experiences shaped the authenticity that mark her stories. She won the 2017 D. K. Dutt Award for her story Charan. Some of her other stories have appeared in Silverfish and Readings into Readings anthologies, while one was shortlisted in the 2021 Masters Review Summer Short Story Award. She lives and works in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
January 10, 2025 ● 1:00 pm
Destiny’s Daughters : Defne Suman and Saras Manickam discuss how secrets and shadows of history make the women in their stories. In conversation with Antara Dutta
Sarojesh Mukerjee teaches Economics and occasionally International History at the Cambridge School, Kolkata, of which he is the founder. He is the author of the well-regarded biography The Life and Times of David Hare: First Secular Educationist of India. He keeps very good company in the form of Pongo the Pointer and Bingo the Boxer.
January 6, 2025 ● 7:00 pm
Broken Images :
A play by Girish Karnad featuring Shabana Azmi. Directed by Alyque Padamsee; Produced by Raell Padamsee's ACE Productions
January 6, 2025 ● 2:15 pm
Seeding A New Cinema - The Legacy of Shyam Benegal : Shabana Azmi and Rajit Kapur discuss the impact of the filmmaker on the country’s cinema. In conversation with Priyanka Roy
Shabnam Minwalla has spent all her life with words, working as a journalist with The Times of India, writing columns and features in various publications and non-fiction books about facets of Mumbai. She is best-known for her books for children and young adults. Her popular books include The Six Spellmakers of Dorabji Street, What Maya Saw, Saira Zariwala is Afraid and the rib-tickling Nimmi series. She has won numerous awards including the Neev Book Award and the Atta Galatta Bangalore Literature Festival Prize for her various books. Her young adult book, Zen, part romance, part history, part politics, won the Auther Award, the Valley of Words Award and the Binod Kanoria Award in 2024. She also teaches creative writing in a Mumbai college and has conducted workshops in schools around the country. Her new book, The Body in the Swimming Pool, is an entertaining murder mystery set in a Mumbai high-rise.
Sheena Patel is a writer and assistant director for the film and TV industry. She is part of the 4 BROWN GIRLS WHO WRITE collective and her debut novel, I’m a Fan, won a British Book Award in the Discover category, has been longlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction, shortlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize and is a finalist for the LA Times Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction.
January 10, 2025 ● 4:30 pm
I’m A Fan : Sheena Patel on her award-winning debut novel. In conversation with Shahana Chatterjee
January 6, 2025 ● 6:20 pm
Einstein O Indubala : Reading by Somak of Bibhutibhushan Bandyapadhyay’s short story, Einstein O Indubala
Somak Raychaudhury is currently Vice-Chancellor, Ashoka University. He graduated from Presidency College, University of Calcutta, and went on to read Physics at Trinity College, University of Oxford. He did his Ph.D. in Astrophysics at the University of Cambridge. He then moved to the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, (CfA) at Cambridge, USA, as a Smithsonian Fellow. He stayed on to work in the High Energy Astrophysics division of the CfA, working for a NASA project, as part of the team that built the Chandra X-Ray Observatory, now in orbit. At this time, he was a Fellow of Lowell House, Harvard University. He moved back to India in 2012, to help rebuild Presidency College, Kolkata, into Presidency University, where he was Dean of Science and Professor and Head of Physics till he moved to Pune in September 2015 as the fourth Director of IUCAA. His work involves a wide range of topics in Cosmology and Astrophysics and has made seminal discoveries using observations at radio, optical and X-ray frequencies, from the ground and from Space. He pioneered the study of galaxy superclusters as the largest structures in the Universe and has discovered some of the largest structures of galaxies in the Universe including the ‘Saraswati’ supercluster of galaxies. In the recent past, he has been in leading positions in several of India’s mega-science international projects, including the Thirty Meter Telescope and LIGO-India. He has developed innovative machine-learning algorithms for mining large astronomical datasets and recently co-chaired the committee to compile the Vision document for the Government of India for the next decade of Astronomy research.
January 6, 2025 ● 5:40 pm
Why We Die : Venki Ramakrishnan discusses science and philosophy in man’s quest for immortality. In conversation with Somak Roy Chowdhury
Srijato was born in a family steeped in music and literature. His father, Tapan Bandyopadhyay, was a journalist and his mother, Srila Bandyopadhyay, is a classical vocalist. He is the grandson of Sangeetacharya Tarapada Badyopadhyay. His first collection of poetry, Shesh Chithhi, was published in 1999. He won the Ananda Puraskar and the Krittibash Puraskar for his poetry volume Udanta Sawb Joker (2004). His other awards include the Bangla Academy Samman (2014), Pashchimbanga Kabita Academy’s Sunil Gangopadhyay Award (2020) and the Government of West Bengal’s Bangabhushan (2022). He has also written novels, songs and screenplays. He has represented Bengali poetry at many forums, both nationally and internationally, including Iowa University’s International Writers Workshop, Edinburgh International Book Fair and the Hay Festival in Wales. He debuted as a film director in 2023. He has also curated the monsoon-themed festival Kolkata Baarish.
January 10, 2025 ● 11:15 am
Samay Kothay Je Choley Gelo : Writing in different ages and stages of one’s life. Readings and reflections by Anindya Chatterjee, Anupam Roy and Srijato. In conversation with Roopsha Dasguupta
January 10, 2025 ● 5:15 pm
The Science in Literature and the Literature in Science Writing : Angela Saini, (TBA), Srijato and Venki Ramakrishnan in conversation with Malavika Banerjee
Stephen P. Huyler is an art historian, cultural anthropologist, photographer and author conducting a lifelong survey of India’s sacred art and crafts and their meanings within rural societies. He has spent an average of four months each year during the last five decades traveling in Indian villages documenting craftsmanship and contemporary traditions. He has served as a consultant and/or guest curator for exhibitions of Indian art including shows at the Smithsonian’s Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, the American Museum of Natural History, the Museum of International Folk Art (Santa Fe), the Santa Barbara Museum of Art, the Houston Museum of Natural Science and Mingei International Museum (San Diego). He is acknowledged as a leading photographer of India with an invaluable and extensive image archive. He has had many solo exhibitions of his images at such venues as the Smithsonian, the Asian Art Museum (San Francisco), the Santa Barbara Museum of Art and the Kodak Center for Creative Imaging. He has published six books – Village India, Painted Prayers: Women’s Art in Village India, Gifts of Earth: Terracottas and Clay Sculptures of India, Meeting God: Elements of Hindu Devotion and Sonabai: Another Way of Seeing.
Subodh Sarkar, born in 1958, is a survivor of a refugee family. He has published 45 books of verse in 50 years. He received the Sahitya Akademi Award in 2013 for the poetry collection titled Dwaipawan Rhader Dhare. He has been invited to read his poems and papers in numerous prestigious international seminars and festivals including the International Writing Programme at the University of Iowa (USA), the Moscow International Book Fair, Charles University at Prague (Czech Republic) and the International Writers Meet at Paros (Greece). He has been conferred an honorary D. Litt from Gour Banga University and Vidya Sagar University of West Bengal. He is a recipient of the Bangabhushan honour from the Government of West Bengal and the Gangadhar Meher National Award from Sambalpur University, Odisha, India. Currently, he is the President of West Bengal Kobita Academy, a State Academy for Poetry, the first of its kind in Asia. He taught English at City College under Calcutta University for 35 years and, briefly, postcolonial literatures at the University of Iowa, USA.
Sujaan Mukherjee is senior curator at the Birla Academy of Art and Culture. He enjoys researching and writing on art, literature and cities. He completed his Ph.D as a SYLFF fellow at Jadavpur University before joining the Centre for Studies in Social Sciences for a two-year stint as Mellon Foundation postdoctoral fellow. He has been associated with numerous museums and archives including DAG’s museums initiative, Victoria Memorial Hall, the School of Cultural Texts and Records at Jadavpur University, the JBMRC at the CSSSC, and the Gurusaday Museum. A two-time India Foundation for the Arts awardee, he is currently researching on Raibenshe, a martial dance form practised in parts of Bengal. He translates from Bangla to English and vice versa, and has published bilingually in academic journals as well as popular platforms. His recent projects includes Dublinnama (2024), a collaborative Bangla translation of James Joyce’s Dubliners, and From the Depth of the Mould (2024), a centenary tribute to Meera Mukherjee, for which he was translator and assistant editor.
January 10, 2025 ● 1:00 pm
Gods, Guns and Missionaries : Manu S. Pillai on his new book. In conversation with Sujaan Mukherjee
January 10, 2025 ● 5:00 pm
Tumi, Ma : Jayasri Burman and Arunava Sinha speak about her book and tryst with art. In conversation with Sujoy Prasad Chatterjee (Introduction by Sunaina Anand)
Suman Mukhopadhyay is an Indian theatre and film director. His debut film Herbert won the National Award for Best Bengali Film. Asamapta premiered in IFFLA, USA, and can be seen on Netflix. His other films include Shesher Kabita, which premiered at the Dubai International Film festival, Kangal Malsat and Mahanagar@Kolkata, which was screened at the Munich, Kerala and New York film festivals. Chaturanga, based on Tagore’s novel, premiered at the Montreal World Film Festival. The film received a Gran Prix award at Bridgefest, Sarajevo, the Best Director award at the Philadelphia Independent Film Festival and the Golden Palm at Mexico International Film Festival. He has also made a Zee5 original feature film Posham Pa and directed five episodes of Parchhayee based on Ruskin Bond’s stories. His latest film Putulnacher Itikatha, based on Manik Bandhopadhyay’s novel, has been selected for the International Film Festival of Rotterdam. His theatre productions range from European drama to major adaptations of Bengali works. Among his many works on stage are Raja Lear, Sunyo Sudhu Sunyo Noy, Bisarjan, Teesta Paarer Brittanto, Samay Asamayer Brittanto and Mephisto.
Sumona Chakravarty heads the Museums Programme at DAG, where she develops education and public engagement projects through the arts. She is also the founder of Hamdasti, a Kolkata-based arts platform for socially engaged arts practices. She is a graduate of the Srishti School of Art Design and Technology, Bangalore, with a Master’s degree from the Graduate School of Design at Harvard University. She has been a Fellow in the ArtThink South Asia Program at Khoj, Delhi and at the Global Cultural Leaders Program, hosted by the European Union.
January 6, 2025 ● 3:10 pm
Patriarchs : Angela Saini on how men came to rule the world. In conversation with Sumona Chakravarty
Swati Hegde is a freelance editor, mindset coach and self-proclaimed coffee shop enthusiast who lives in Bangalore and can often be found at the nearest café with a hot mug of tea. Her debut novel, Match Me If You Can, released in June 2024 with Penguin India. In her free time, she loves curling up on the couch with a good romance novel or singing Taylor Swift songs on stage at karaoke night.
Swati Sengupta is an author and gender rights educator. Her books include Rebellion In Ranchi, the Incredible Life series (eight non-fiction books for young readers), Half The Field Is Mine, Out of War, Guns On My Red Earth, Murder In The City (translation), The Talking Bird and A Tea Garden Party. She runs a gender workshop series for the young titled The Elephant In The Room. Her Dear Boys programme on gender sensitization for teenage boys has won her many bouquets and a few brickbats. She chose to ignore the brickbats and continues her audacious and unflinching determination to focus on talking to young boys on gender equality. A former journalist, she has worked for over two decades with leading newspapers in India.
Tanmoy Chakraborty is a poet, columnist, translator and lyricist. He has 14 volumes of poetry to his credit including translations and editorial contributions. He is a recipient of many prestigious awards like Krittibash Puroshkar, Dwijendralal Roy Padak and Binoy Majumder Smriti Samman. He has been invited to a number of poetry readings and workshops by the Sahitya Akademi, Multicultural NSW (Australia), American Centre Kolkata, Alliance Française du Bengale, Viswa Bharati (Santiniketan), Kolkata Literature Festival, Jatiya Kabita Utsab (Dhaka, Bangladesh) and National Symposium of Poets (All India Radio, Kolkata), among several other places in India and abroad. He is a regular columnist for leading magazines and newspapers in Kolkata. He has also written lyrics for a web series and worked as a screenplay writer and narrator for a poetry-based short film.
Upamanyu Chatterjee is the author of English, August: An Indian Story (1988), The Last Burden (1993), The Mammaries of the Welfare State (2000), Weight Loss (2006), Way to Go (2011), Fairy Tales at Fifty (2014), and Villainy (2022), all novels; The Revenge of the Non-vegetarian (2018), a novella and The Assassination of Indira Gandhi (2019), a collection of long stories. In 2000, he won the Sahitya Akademi Award and in 2008, he was awarded the Order of Officier des Arts et des Lettres by the French Government for his contribution to literature. His new book, Lorenzo Searches for the Meaning of Life, which has won the JCB Prize for Literature in 2024 is a study of the extraordinary experiences of an ordinary man and of both the majesty and the banality of the spiritual path. This novel marks a new phase in the literary journey of one of India’s finest and most consistently original writers.
Veena Raman graduated from Nagpur University with a BA degree and also has a diploma in Travel and Tourism Management. She retired as General Manager, Marketing, Madhya Pradesh Tourism after serving 29 years. She has represented the Madhya Pradesh Government, both nationally and internationally, at many travel symposia. She has also represented India in Women’s Hockey in 1975 and been active in table tennis, basketball and athletics. She has been involved with an NGO in Pune working in the sphere of women’s empowerment. Her husband, Late Vijay Raman, was a distinguished member of the IPS winning accolades for bravery, courage and dedication to duty.
January 10, 2025 ● 11:15 am
Khaki Lines and Steel Frames : Rajesh Patil and Veena Raman discuss chronicles of police and bureaucratic life. In conversation with Mrityunjay Singh
Sir Venki Ramakrishnan shared the 2009 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for uncovering the structure of the ribosome. A member of the National Academy of Sciences, he runs the Ramakrishnan Lab at the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, England. From 2015 to 2020, he served as President of the Royal Society, one of the world’s oldest scientific organizations. He is the author of the frank scientific memoir Gene Machine. His latest book, Why We Die: The New Science of Ageing and the Quest for Longevity, is a narrative of uncommon insight and beauty from one of our leading public intellectuals.
January 6, 2025 ● 5:40 pm
Why We Die : Venki Ramakrishnan discusses science and philosophy in man’s quest for immortality. In conversation with Somak Roy Chowdhury
January 10, 2025 ● 5:15 pm
The Science in Literature and the Literature in Science Writing : Angela Saini, (TBA), Srijato and Venki Ramakrishnan in conversation with Malavika Banerjee
Vibha Batra is an award-winning and bestselling author, graphic novelist, advertising consultant, poet, lyricist, translator, playwright, script writer, travel writer, columnist, speaker and creative writing mentor. She has published 28 books and over 100 short stories. Her travelogues have appeared in The Hindu, Conde Nast Traveller, Deccan Chronicle and The Week. Several of her short plays have been staged during the Short and Sweet Theatre Festival South India and her play Cold Feet won Best Script in 2017. One of her plays, The Social Butterfly, was staged on the occasion of GST Day in Chennai. She wrote the Hindi lyrics for Thuppaki and has written the anthems for leading corporate houses like The Chola Group, Murugappa, Brakes India, GBS India, Foxconn India and Cavin Kare. Her short stories and poems have appeared in the Chicken Soup series, international anthologies and several magazines. She has conducted creative writing workshops independently for children and adults. Her Sweet Sixteen trilogy and The Secret Life of Debbie G have been optioned for screen adaptation by leading production houses.
Vikram Iyengar is a Kolkata-based arts leader and connector working internationally. A dancer-choreographer-director, curator-presenter and arts researcher-writer, his work spans performance practice, discourse, critique, ideation, consultancy and management with the central tenet of creating deep connections with and through the arts. His performance practice spans choreography for stage and film, dance and theatre explorations and collaborations in India and abroad. He has curated for festivals in Scotland, South Africa and elsewhere in India. Guest faculty at various universities, he has collaborated as ideator and/or discussant in several international projects at the intersection of arts, academia, and socio-cultural studies. His articles and reviews regularly feature in academic and arts publications. He is the founder-director of the Pickle Factory Dance Foundation that has brought in a range of Indian and international artists and guests to Calcutta since 2018. An ARThink South Asia Arts Management Fellow, he is a Fellow Grad of the International Society for Performing Arts and alumnus of Creative Australia’s International Arts Leaders Programme. In December 2015, he was awarded the Ustad Bismillah Khan Yuva Puraskar for contemporary dance by the national Sangeet Natak Akademi. In 2024-25, he is one of 10 worldwide Global Connectors for IETM – an international network for contemporary performing arts.
January 6, 2025 ● 4:30 pm
Y : A reading of Avik Chanda’s play by Barun Chanda and Vinay Sharma
