Third Odisha Lit Fest begins in city

Odisha Sun Times Bureau
Bhubaneswar, Nov 3:

The Third edition of Odisha Literary Festival, organised by The New Indian Express Group is all set to get underway here on Tuesday. A host of top litterateurs, journalists and political personalities will take part in the two-day mega event.

Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik will inaugurate the literary festival and deliver the keynote address in presence of Editorial Director of The New Indian Express Prabhu Chawla. The Chief Minister will also release the book “2014: The Election That Changed India” authored by eminent journalist Rajdeep Sardesai on the occasion.

Day 1 of the Lit Fest will comprise five sessions. The first session on “Political Literature: Does the Kiss and Tell Method Work?” will be chaired by Prabhu Chawla with former Union Minister Natwar Singh, Rajdeep Sardesai and journalist and activist Madhu Kishwar in the panel.

The second session “Can Literature Change Mindsets, especially about Women?” will be chaired by eminent Odia writer and Bharatiya Jnanapith Award winner Pratibha Ray. Maulana Mahmood Madani, KR Meera and Monical Das will be panelists for the session.

The third session “Reinterpreting the Epics” will have Bibek Debroy, BN Patnaik and Christopher C. Doyle as panelists with noted author and Moortidevi Award winner Hara Prasad Das in the chair.

Former Chief Election Commissioner SY Quraishi, Maulana Mahmood Madani, columnist Ashok Malik and Editor of leading Odia daily Sambad Soumya Ranjan Patnaik will be on the panel for the fourth session on “Threat to Independent Writing.” Noted journalist and columnist Shankkar Aiyar will chair the session.

A special session on Odia “Tracing the Odia Identity: Which medium does it best?” will be the fifth session of the day. Dharmendra Pradhan, Union Minister of State for Petroleum & Natural Gas will deliver the keynote address while Pratibha Ray, eminent dramatist Anant Mahapatra and famous Odissi dancer Kumkum Mohanty will be the panelists. Former Chief Secretary Subas Pani will chair the session.

The day will end with an Odissi dance recital on Shri Krishna Bhakti by Kumkum Mohanty’s troupe.

The second day will have seven sessions. It will start with a story telling session for kids by The Storywallahs to be followed by a session on “Business writing in India.” Author Rashmi Bansal will be in conversation with academician and writer Pushpesh Pant in the session.

The third session of the day “Writing for a visual medium” will have writers Vikas Swarup and film-makers Lavlin Thadani and Nila Madhab Panda.

The fourth session “Mapping the World Through Prose” will feature V Sunil, Ranendra Kumar, Kishalay Bhattacharjee and Aman Nath. The fifth session will be on “The new voices in Indian literature” with Kavita Kane, Sangeeta Bandyopadhyay, Satyarth Nayak and Sujit Mahapatra on the panel.

The sixth session “The Author as a Chronicler of History” will have Rabisankar Bal, Sumedha Ojha, Ravi Shankar Etteth and Priya Kapoor as panelists. The festival will close with a session of Hindi story telling for adults by The Storywallahas.