After a euphoric start at Jim’s Jungle Retreat, Jim Corbett National Park, Uttarakhand, the second day of YES BANK Kumaon Literary Festival (KLF) was full of intellectual excitement when discussions were made on some of the highly sensitive issues of the present times. Day 2 began with the discussion session ‘Yours Versus My Nationalism’ at the Pathaar Taal, where Hindol Sengupta, Rana Ayyub, Shahid Siddiqui, and Sunil Alagh were the key speakers and the debate was moderated by Vikram Sampath. Rana Ayyub talked about nationalism and patriotism by comparing various countries.
Based on the reading interests and habits of the young audience, the topic of the second session was ‘I Choose to Be Different,’ Antara Ganguli and Neeraj Jain threw light on this interesting topic and the discussion was moderated by Mona Verma. This was followed by an hourlong ‘Tell Me Your Story Workshop’ at Rangshala where the performance of Kanchana Banerjee, Kiran Manral, and Koral Dasgupta gained much appreciation by the proponents of modern literature.
Vidya Shah threw light on the journeys of female performers in India. AS Chandiok and MK Raina were the key panelists in the session ‘Vo bhi kya din the’, moderated by Sumant Batra, founder of KLF. The session was based on gradual degradation of institutional traditions and values. Nupur Sharma, Priyanka Chaturvedi, Tuhin Sinha and Abhay Kumar Dubey were the key panelists in the session ‘Women in Politics,’ moderated by Nistha Satyam.
Noted author Amish Tripathi spoke on nature; how we viewed nature in ancient times and how we see it in the modern age, while Professor Ajay Rawat unfolded many mysterious layers of the history of Uttarakhand in the session ‘As Seen through the Eyes of a Historian’. Gurcharan Das in conversation with Rakhee Bakshee on ‘The Difficulty of Being Good’ was also a thought provoking session.
The absorbing range of discussions at KLF 2016 covered topics as varied as ‘Yours Versus My Nationalism’, ‘Tell Me Your Story Workshop’ and ‘I Choose to be Different’ among many others.
In the post-lunch session, ‘Naya Bharat, Nayi Pehchaan – Rajneeti ke Naye Ayyam’ was an interesting discussion among Abhay Kumar Dubey, Panini Anand, Sudheendra Kulkarni and Tarun Vijay.
The book cover of ‘Akhbar’ by Shazi Zaman was also launched at KLF 2016. Shazi Zaman, in conversation with Sumant Batra, discussed the gripping tale on how ‘Akhbar’ tried to understand various demonstrations of his time and took on powerful temporal and religious faces.
In a cozy literary night, the Day2 of KLF concluded with ‘Down the Memory Lane,’ a narration by Rashmi Agrawal. Batra said, “Authors, speakers and other intellectual personalities are enjoying the unpolluted environment of thoughts and knowledge sharing. It is the kind of environment where every creative mind seeks to express his/her views and opinion. I hope this festival will also be very useful in creating a positive literary environment across the entire nation.”
