And the biggest hazard is ...

Sunil Ganguly is one of India's most famous writers and president of the autonomous but federal government-funded Sahitya Academy, the country's highest literary council. He is a household name in the Bengali-speaking world and his stories and novels have been turned into films by eminent directors like Satyajit Ray and Goutam Ghosh. S. N. M. Abdi, a bdnews24.com Contributing Editor in India, spoke to Ganguly on the significance of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's visit to Bangladesh and the state of Dhaka-Delhi relations. Excerpts:

What are the images Bangladesh conjures up for you? 
I was born there! So I have plenty of vivid memories. I was born in 1934 in a village called Pub Maijpara near Madaripur. My father was a school teacher in Calcutta. But we regularly visited our ancestral home in Pub Maijpara during summer and winter holidays. However in 1942 when the Japanese were bombing Calcutta, my father despatched us to Maijpara for an entire year. I was even admitted to a school in Maijpara as schools and colleges in Calcutta were shut down because of the war.

As the Japanese were rice-eaters, the British government seized rice stocks fearing a land invasion by the Japanese army. We had to subsist on potatoes. Potatoes for breakfast, lunch and dinner. We carried fried potatoes to school in our pockets. During the lunch break, the school staff provided salt! And there were potato 'wars' in the classroom - children hurling potatoes at one another like grenades!

In 1943 we returned to Calcutta. It was the year of the Great Bengal Famine. But those who had money could buy food - including rice. I have been a frequent visitor to Bangladesh over the years. But I never went back to Maijpara until 2008. But that, as they say, is another story.

Full report here BDNews24

Scholar wins award for translation

Prominent scholar and litterateur Mrs. Asma Saleem was awarded Sahitya Akademi’s award for her Urdu translated book Safar at a ceremony in Panaji on August 20.

The Sahitya Akademi translation awards presentation ceremony was held at the Kala Academy’s Dinanath Mangeshkar hall. The welcome speech was delivered by the secretary of Sahitya Akademi, Mr Agrahar Krishnamurti. The president of Sahitya Akademi, Mr Sunil Gangopadhyay presided over the function.

The chief guest for the function was eminent Malayalam writer, M T Vasudevan Nair. The vice-president of Sahitya Akademi, Mr Sutindar Singh Noor presented the vote of thanks.

Translators of 23 languages were awarded for their contribution on the occasion including Asma Saleem, the translation award winner in Urdu, 2009.

Full report here TwoCircles

Let us get past ‘Gitanjali’

How should Tagore live on? As the 150th birth anniversary celebrations begin, author Sunil Gangopadhyay revisits the legacy

In the 1950s, when some of us were aspiring to be poets and writers in Bengal, we were “Rabindra-birodhi“ (Rabindranath-resisting) and even made disparaging remarks about him. Tagore died in 1941 and our intention in opposing him has mostly been unexplained. More than wanting to attack Tagore, our target were the Rabindrik people (the Rabindranath-fixated), his chelas, who thought literature ended with Tagore and whoever would write after him would merely clone Tagore.

We staked our claim and maintained that Bengali literature couldn’t stop at Tagore. While publicly we opposed, at home and with friends we would ceaselessly sing Rabindra sangeet (Tagore’s songs).

I don’t call myself Rabindra-birodhi any longer. I have since studied Tagore well and have discovered him anew. It is also pointless to oppose him since post-Tagore modern Bengali literature is now well-established, Tagore too has moved to the classical realm and one can’t revolt against what is classic.

Full report here Mint

Wayward city

Will Nimtala Ghat turn into Rabindra Ghat? If it does, it will be part of a great Calcutta tradition

Union minister of shipping Mukul Roy has expressed a desire to rename Nimtala Ghat as Rabindra Ghat. Some feel it would be apt, not as an honour to Rabindranath, but symbolically. A burning ghat named after Tagore would, with the right touch of morbidity, announce the final departure of Bengal’s greatest culture icon from contemporary life, which is happening unchecked anyway, irrespective of the number of Rabindrasangeets being remixed for the audience of multiplex Bong films.

But many more object to the idea, for many reasons.

Says writer Sunil Ganguly, one of the most vocal critics of the proposal: “Rabindranath was cremated at Nimtala Ghat. But that does not mean that the ghat’s name has to be changed.” Professor Swapan Chakraborty, who teaches English at Jadavpur University, agrees that the change is uncalled for. “If a change has to be made it should be to the name of some benefactor, such as with Kashi Mitrer Ghat, not of a celeb cremated there. Could one name a burial ground after someone buried there?” he asks.

Full report here Telegraph

Ghose to make film on Sufi poet

Renowned Indian filmmaker Gautam Ghose is here to finish work on his film Moner Manush, based on the life of 19th century Sufi poet and Baul music exponent Lalon Fakir.

Ghose says current social and political unrest inspired him to tell the story of Lalon Fakir, who spearheaded a social movement in the 19th century to unite Hindus and Muslims.

Legend has it that Rabindranath Tagore never met Lalon when the latter organised peasants against him, but his elder brother Jyotirindranath did. But Rabindranath Tagore in his 1933 London Hebart Lecture applauded him as a mystic poet who discovered 'soul' and the meaning of 'man'.

Based on Sunil Gangopadhyay's novel, Moner Manush has Prosenjit Chatterjee in the lead role. This is Ghose's first Indo- Bangladesh co-production after the much-acclaimed 1993 movie Padma Nadir Majhi.

Full report here Sify