The Writer’s Flight

Imagine living life with eyes closed. This is a real-life account of Delhi based girl Sheetal who turned blind at the age of 11 years. Simple tasks become complicated with loss of sight but read on to explore how Sheetal did not treat her blindness as end of the world and found support in braille, music, cooking, and mom's unwavering support   By Preeti Bhatt In the corridors of life, some are faced with shadows so profound they overshadow the brightest of days. Sheetal's journey began amidst such darkness when she lost her sight in middle school. It was a moment that cast her into an uncharted realm, a world without light, leaving her to grapple with an endless array of challenges. The initial plunge into blindness was disorienting, to say the least. Simple tasks, once taken for granted, became monumental hurdles. The very notion of navigating daily routines seemed insurmountable, and the fear of the unknown loomed ominously. Imagine the terror of stepping into the unkn...

  “In another ten years, Hindi and other Indian languages will see revival like never before. It took 150 years for Britishers to destroy our legacy of languages. We should give ourselves at least a decade to restore things,” said Santosh Choubey, Chancellor of Rabindranath Tagore University and Director of Vishwarang, a festival celebrating Indian literature, art, culture since year 2019.  The fifth edition of Tagore International Literature and Arts Festival – Vishwarang 2023 was held from 21-24 December in Bhopal at Rabindranath Tagore University. Santosh Choubey emphasized the potential for Hindi to evolve into a global language, the importance of extending equal respect to all Indian languages and urged a reconsideration of folk languages, local dialects and references in indigenous languages. He said that technology presents a great opportunity to be a “force multiplier, creating a critical mass to start a chain reaction of sorts and make networking easier.” Technology...

  The fifth edition of Tagore International Literature and Arts Festival – Vishwarang 2023 was held from 21-24 December in Bhopal at Rabindranath Tagore University with a focus on promotion of Hindi as well as other Indian languages.  Namrata Kohli spoke to Santosh Choubey, Chancellor of Rabindranath Tagore University and Director of Vishwarang on the relevance of Hindi and vernacular in current times  How would you describe the current state of affairs of the Hindi language?   Hindi presents a great opportunity and today technology is a force multiplier which is creating a critical mass to start a chain reaction, making networking easier in Hindi. Technology has enabled the access to regional language fonts even on mobile phones and laptops. But if we want to expand Hindi, we must give due respect and importance to each and every other Indian language. These are languages of an entire country, and every community must be represented and respected and there is no...

Choosing a career can be the most daunting decision for an individual and more so in India where you are often fulfilling your parents' aspiration or meeting societal expectations. Life throws its own set of challenges irrespective of whether you make it to the IIT or not. This is a real-life account narrated by  Rupaditya Adireddy, whose  journey was full of trials and tribulations "I was once a little enthusiast, having no worries, no hurdles, no responsibilities. I used to be on my own inventing my games, dissecting all my toys, and repairing them with band-aids and cellophane. People around would giggle at me and say “You will be a doctor in future”. Whenever I used to do something weird or recreate something from the internet they used to say “You will be a scientist”. When I used to play in sand piles digging tunnels and connecting them without breaking the sand they said, “You will be an engineer”. But no one ever asked me what I would want to become. Well, I sti...

  Miniature Plates From Plated Project’s Collection Celebrating Lamborghini’s 60th Anniversary In India Are Displayed at an Exhibition In Delhi. (Handout Photo) Namrata Kohli New Delhi Artist Simran K S Lamba paints with a material that is commonplace and not thought of as ‘art’: Coal tar. "My association with tar and allied media started in 2006 when I was waterproofing the terrace of our house and I stumbled across the latent potential that was in this industrial agent," he says. “Everyday materials transform into a space where the subtleties of these materials echo in various ways, giving them a new life as a piece of art," he says about his new exhibition called 'TAR-ART An Anagram of My Life'. Mixed media is the flavour of the season in Indian art. Coal tar, ropes, nails, metal discs and wax would be ordinary, utilitarian objects to people, but for artists like Lamba they are creative fuel. “Art is getting very inclusive to include all kinds of materia...

Coming to Ram Janmabhoomi was a dream come true for me... it's not about how beautiful the temple is and its marvelous architecture etc, but it's all about being Ram Janmabhoomi or  the birthplace of Shree Ram.  In my recent book, I have put a full chapter on this (Ram Mandir: Chapter 7  Culture during Crisis  ;  संकट में संस्कृति ) where there is a full interview with Shri Ashish Sompura, son of Chandrakant Sompura, the chief architect of the Mandir. I asked him what, in his experience, was the most important thing about the temple? He said that the most important thing is the place – the land and the location. The main thing is one cannot change the location of Ram Lalla (infant form of Lord Rama). He said and I quote - "kisi bhi aadmi ka janam hota hai, woh hota hai 6 by 3 ki khatiya mein [when a person is born, he or she is born on a 6 by 3 bed]”, which means this is the garb griha or the sanctum sanctorum, the innermost...