SUFI TALES

The Chandigarh Sahitya Akademi today held a function at the Central
State Library, Sector 34, to launch the publication of Pilgrimage to
Paradise: Sufi Tales from Rumi, written by Kamla Kapur. The book has
been published by Penguin in India and Mandala in the US.
The author has lived in Chandigarh for several years and is not based
in the US. She got her Bachelor's in English Honors from India, and
her Masters' Degree in literature from Kent State University,
Ohio,USA. She also took classes in creative writing from the
University of Iowa, and the University of California in San Diego.
Since 1985, Ms Kapur has been commuting between the USA and India.She
has recently completed her first novel, The Autobiography of Saint
Padma the Whore, and a fantasy novel, Malini in Whirlwood. She lives
half the year in a remote Kullu Valley in the Himalayas and the other
half in California, with her husband Payson R. Stevens.
Pilgrimage to Paradise presents the author’s passion for Sufi thought.
Inspired by Rumi, Kamla K. Kapur has reworked translations of thirty
of his stories—tales of wit, wisdom, and faith. The basis for Kapur’s
stories is Rumi’s six-volume Mathnawi, as translated from Persian by
Reynold A. Nicholson. Kapur puts her own spin on the stories, yet
remaining true to Rumi’s vision.
Presiding over the session, the noted theatre person, Neelam Mansingh,
who is also a personal friend of the author, expressed her
appreciation of the Kapur’s reworking of Sufi tales.
Earlier, Professor Manju Jaidka, Chairperson of the Chandigarh
Sahitya Akademi, announced that such events are a routine part of the
Akademi’s functioning. Two more book launches will be held in October.
On 7th October Ms S. Kalha will preside over the book launch of Neena
Kahlon’s book at the Library in Sector 34, and on 13th October the
Chandigarh Sahitya akademi will collaborate with Ratnasagar and
Collins Publishers to launch their new illustrated dictionary. The
event on the 13th will be chaired by Prof Rupin Desai of Delhi
University.

Sufi Tales

BOOK LAUNCH


Pilgrimage to Paradise

Sufi Tales from Rumi

by Kamla Kapur


To be introduced by
Neelam Man Singh


Date: 26th Sept 2009
Time 5 pm
Venue: Sector 34 State Library, First Floor. Chandigarh

Forthcoming events - October 2009

FORTHCOMING EVENTS:
October 7th, 5PM: Book Launch at the Sector 34 Library. Neena Kahlon's book, "Remembering the Juice Mango" (Rupa, 2009). Author in conversation with Miss S. Kalha.

Oct 9th, 5 PM: at the Govt Museum Auditorium, Sector 10. Launch of a new Illustrated Dictionary published by Collins and Ratnasagar.

STAY TUNED, FOLKS!

HINDI DIVAS CELEBRATIONS

Hindi Divas celebration.
Sector 34 Library

10.30 AM on 13th September 2009.
Main Speaker: Dr Giriraj Sharan Aggarwal
Chair: Prof MP Bhardwaj

Dr Giriraj Sharan Aggarwal, editor of Shodh Disha, located in Bijnore, spoke passionately of the need to champion the Hindi language in the face of govt apathy. He stressed the fact that Hindi has a rich vocabulary and is used by people all over the world. Why, then, should it not be used in all institutions in India. Computer programmes are available in Hinda and Wikipedia too has information in Hindi. Besides, with the help of Unicode it is now easy to translate any language on the basis of phonetics. For these reasons, according to Dr Aggarwal, there is a crying need in our country to focus on the development and promotion of the Hindi language.
Prof MP Bhardwaj, in his presidential remarks, endorsed Dr Aggarwal's views but stressed that the development of Hindi should not be at the cost of other languages. Languages can learn a lot from each other and be mutually beneficial instead of hostile to each other.
Prof Jagmohan Chopra and Dr Gurmeet Singh of Panjab University also spoke on this occasion. Both had a positive approach to the issues raised and reiterated that languages do not exist in isolation; they can be developed simultaneously and we in India can gain a lot by being open-minded towards the languages and customs of people outside our own cloisters.

Hindi Divas 2009

Hindi Divas celebration.
Sector 34 Library

10.30 AM on 13th September 2009.
Main Speaker: Dr Giriraj Sharan Aggarwal
Chair: Prof MP Bhardwaj

You are invited.

Farooq sheikh speaking of stories on the silver screen

Indubala Singh's introduction to Farooq Sheikh:

Farooq Sahib actually needs no introduction, nor do I think he is an artist in 'Search of an Audience' because, it is the audience which actually seeks him out. Farooq Sahib is a man of abundant aptitude, an intellectual, and above all a man of great personal charm without any hypocrisy or any sort of self-deception. He is in fact a trained lawyer but never followed the profession. He was born to a lawyer father and mother in a village in Baroda district , Gujrat which to this day he visits and takes care of his lands there. He had his schooling in St Mary's and went to St Xavier's College after which he joined Siddharth College of Law, Bombay -- mainly because attendance wasn't compulsory there and he could rehearse and act in the IPTA plays. In fact he is a gift of IPTA to Indian Cinema and he entered the film world as a committed artist in 1973 in Garam Hawa, directed by MS Sathyu, senior director of IPTA. In the film he enacted the role of Sikander. Based on theme of the partition of India, the unsentimental directness of the film was remarkable. It was highly acclaimed and also screened at the Cannes film festival. It ran into trouble with the Indian censors but neverthless was awarded the National award for National Integration in 1973.

Farooq Sahib had no intention of being a professional actor but after the film's acclaim he was noticed by Satyajit Ray who called him up and offered him the role of Aqueel in Shatranj ke Khiladi in 1977 and in 1979 Muzaffar Ali offered him a lead role in Gaman of a migrant from UP who becomes a taxi driver in Bombay. After that in 1979 itself, came his first commercial hit -- Noorie against our own Chandigrh beauty, Poonam Dhillon. Even though the film was a huge success , he was embarassed as he felt he was not cut out for song, dance, and fight kind of sequences. After that he did not do any film for two years but in 1981 Sai Paranjpaye called him to read the script of Chasme Budoor,a romantic comedy. He enacted the lovable Siddharth Parashar. In 1992 he did a naughty mishievous Hare Bashudev in Hare -Tortoise story. Sai had great fondness for weaving humorous fables and both of the films constitute two of the best comedies of Hindi cinema.

In I981 Farooq Sahib did Umrao Jaan with Muzaffar Ali again and the film turned out to be a memorable one not only for its excellent adaptation of Mirza Hadi Rusva's novel in Urdu by the same name but also for its art direction and outstanding performances of Rekha and Farooq Sahib. Interestingly the rendition of the beautiful song 'In aankhon ki masti' which is picturised on both of them had extremely sensitive close ups of Farooq Sahib accentuating his poetic eyes. In fact Naseerud din Shah, who was one of the characters, conceded that it was Farooq Sahib who brought the real senstivity to his role of all the male leads in the film.

In 1982 Farooq Sahib portrayed another sensitive character of Sarju in Saagar Sarhadi's film Bazaar. There after he did a classical comedy with Hrishikesh Mukherji as Prof Jeet Saxena in Rang Birangi. In fact he learnt a lot from Hrishida and decided to do less films and moved on to Television as it was opening up contentwise. He enjoyed doing Shrikant for 2 years on TV and after that became the ribbling host of Jeena isi ka naam hai which was a huge success as he looked into the lives of achievers without a definite script.

Another land mark was the play Tumhari Amrita he did with Shabana Azmi which was adapted from A.G. Varney's Love Letters and directed very ably by Firoze Khan. The play was planned as an experimental show for Jennifer Kapoor Festival in Feb1992 and it to have 4-5 shows but it had more than 250 shows and was staged almost all over the world except Australia.Recently Farooq Sahib was seen in Saas Bahu and Sensex.

Farooq Sahib has been rather a cinematic epitome of the common man and the buoyant boy nextdoor. With his near-natural acting he enriched every role he essayed with sincerity and conviction, revealing the full range of his versatile acting talent in almost all the genres.