‘I am Still Exploring . . .’

Astad Deboo One of India’s first contemporary dancers, ASTAD DEBOO has performed extensively both in the—country and abroad. He has innovated compositions working with puppeteer Dadi Padumjee and life size puppets, as well as classical musicians, and the element of theatre in his presentations is particularly marked. Here he talks to STQ of his move towards a modern Indian dance idiom. Interpolations by ANJUM KATYAL, BIREN DAS SHARMA and SREEJATA GUHA appear bracketed, in italics. My very first experience of dance was in the city of Calcutta. My mother used to study dance and music home for her own enjoyment and knowledge. She didn’t have any desire to perform. But she was interested in the Indian tradition of dance and music and I distinctly remember her in our living room re she used to study.[…]

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Ebrahim Alkazi [18 October 1925 – 4 August 2020]

A Tribute by Samik Bandyopadhyay There was providence in that he did not live to see the bhumipuja at Ayodhya, the culmination of a years long trajectory of brutal majoritarianism, vandalism, violent divisiveness and genocide. Ebrahim Alkazi passed away the day before. He loved to talk about his growing up in Pune, studying at an English medium Christian school, with a young private tutor teaching him Arabic and, reading the Koran with him at home; taking legitimate pride in being as much an Arab as an Indian. A Nehruvian to the core in his temperamental and cultural inclusiveness, Alkazi was Nehru’s choice for the position of Director of the National School of Drama two years before his death. Meanwhile Alkazi had made his choice between his two early passions, preferring theatre to painting, but retaining[…]

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So many unfinished conversations . . . 

Prof Hari Vasudevan will always be remembered and deeply missed by several generations of students, scholars and teachers.Having spent almost his entire academic career in Kolkata, in 2005, Hari was invited by the Union human resources development ministry to chair the textbook development committee for the social sciences of the National Centre for Educational Research and Training (NCERT). He worked with a large team and consulted widely to produce a set of textbooks that were applauded by teachers and students.August 2017 he spoke on ‘History Textbooks and the Idea of India’ at the History for Peace annual conference. For school teachers attending the conference it was a rare treat—to interact with this warm accessible scholar who was one of the strong forces behind the textbooks that guided their entire teaching practice.January 2020, he was scheduled[…]

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Digital Readings @ Seagull # 6

In this reading session we will look at stories of migration and labour. Economic need has been one of the primary factors which drive people to travel, uproot them from their homes, expose them to long, often perilous journeys across seas and oceans. In this lock-down, images of migrant labourers, risking long and physically hazardous journeys have flooded news outlets. Histories of countries around the Bay of Bengal have been shaped by painful, often desperate stories of migration. But this migrant population also lends itself to the unique and fraught post-colonial identity of these nations. Issues of identity still remain unresolved decades after these countries decolonized and grappled with making their boundaries and fixing down notions of national identity.In this session, we will talk about this difficult history.Bring any reading which involves representations of migrant[…]

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