Bhopal: Three three-day Bhopal Literature & Art Festival (BLF) concluded with band performance and literary discussions at Bharat Bhawan on Monday. Organised by Society for Culture and Environment, it was the first edition of the fest based on theme ‘Heartland Stories’.
The evening session began with musical performance by Upswing Rock Band at Bahirang. The band presented their compositions like ‘Stormy weather…,’ ‘Keep Faith…,’ ‘A Minor Mistake…,’ ‘Perfectly Golden…,’ ‘Find My Way…,’ ‘Clap Clap and Intehan…,’ ‘Warcry…,’ ‘Paintball Hero…’ and ‘Wings of Fire….,’ mesmerised the audience. The band members were Ritvik Virmani on lead, rhythm, bass and drums, Adil Hasan on lead, rhythm, bass, Abhishek Sharma on rhythm and bass, Sarthak Kayastha on drums and lyrics and vocal by Diksha Dixit.
Besides, various literary discussion sessions were held. In the morning session at Abhirang, a discussion on book Chanakya in you, written by Radhakrishnan Pillai, along with M M Upadhyay and Tejinder Bhogal who were the moderators in the session. “I have studied 6000 Sutras of Economics in original sanskrit. I have researched on Chanakya on public demand. I have applied the study of economics on my life personally and have experienced the change”, said the author.
Pillai has already authored 12 book on Chanakya and he has five more books on Chanakya to be realised. He further shared that Sanskrit is a practical language and its root are very deep. He also shared his views on wealth building wherein he said wealth creation is difficult and sudden switch of career is dangerous and doesn’t help in building wealth. India requires more entrepreneurs and that the westernisation of the typical terms from the western world needs to be understood correctly.
The third session was on the book named Fitness and Food written by Kavita Devgan who was in conversation with Dr Pradeep Kapoor and Amita Singh. The book has content about the types of food and recipes that contributes to escalate the fitness level in one’s body. A discussion on Margot: Sister Nivedita of Vivekananda, by Reba Som in conversation with Kalyan Kumar Chakravarty, ‘Jangarh Singh Shyam: A Conjuror’s Archive, Jyotindra Jain in conversation with Annapurna Garimella, Leading Leadership: Ready For Take Off, Sachit Jain in conversation with Animesh Parihar And Padmavat: An Epic Love Story by Purushottam Agrawal. “I cried along with the students while reading the Padmavat, says, Purushottam Agrawal.
A discussion ‘Swaminathan: Ek Jeewani’ by Akhilesh Verma was held in fifth session. The fifth session revolved around remembering the life-incidents of the most influential artist of India who was instrumental in establishing Bharat Bhavan in the city. The session involved Akhilesh Verma who wrote the book, Swaminathan: Ek Jeewani in conversation with Vivek Tambe. The writer shared the life instances of Swaminathan as to how simple personality he was and the way he was loved by everyone.
He shared that one of the wife of his friends weaved a woolen sweater who was from Norway, not just single time but twice when he lost it somewhere. One of the lady from the audience shared that she had been the admirer of Swaminathan from the beginning and her love for him allowed her to come back to the city from Delhi after 14 years, only to find that he was no more. The session ended up with the moderator reciting Swaminathan’s poem. In seventh session, A discussion on ’Kavya Drishti,’ by Ratan Thiyam was also held. He was in conversation is with Hindi poet Sangeeta Gundecha.