[Reader-list] Details of sessions at Sarai-CSDS Independent Fellowship Workshop

[Vivek Narayanan]

Please note: this document is about 26 printed pages long.

PROGRAMME

Working Questions: the 2007 Sarai-CSDS Independent Fellowship Workshop
3-7 December 2007


Monday 3 December
Venue: Sarai-CSDS, 29 Rajpur Road, CSDS

6.00 – 10.00 pm
Opening Reception and Launch of Working Questions (the Sarai-CSDS 
Independent Fellowship Book)

Opening Remarks
by Professor Rajeev Bhargava
Director, CSDS

Reflecting on Five Years of the Sarai-CSDS Fellowship Programme
Shuddabrata Sengupta
Vivek Narayanan
Debjani Sengupta
Mahmood Farooqui


Tuesday 4 December – Friday 7 December
10.00 am – 8.00 pm
LTG Auditorium – Mandi House
(Upstairs)

Working Questions: a curated multimedia exhibition of work and archival 
material by Sarai-CSDS Independent Fellows

This curated journey gathers together a wide and various range of 
audio-visual and print material from Sarai’s archives, collected and 
produced by Independent Fellows. It features photographic work, graphic 
panels, audio and visual loops, short films, etc., from research areas 
as diverse as Jazz in Bollywood, glass negatives from early cinema, 
signage in the Indian city, digital imaging in photo studios, street 
musicians, video theaters, and much much more…


Tuesday 4 December
Venue: LTG Auditorium, Mandi House

10.30 – 12.00
History Versus Reminiscence
Chair: Debjani Sengupta
[Debjani Sengupta (debjanisgupta @yahoo.com) is an ex independent fellow 
and teaches English Literature at Indraprastha College, Delhi 
University. She is the editor of Mapmaking: Partition Stories from two 
Bengals, and has translated Taslima Nasreen’s Selected Columns. Most 
recently, she co-edited and wrote Working Questions , the Sarai 
Independent Fellowship book.]

Anuja Ghosalkar
Papa Ajoba: My Grandfather, the Film Make Up Artist

The project chronicles the life of my grandfather, who was a make up 
artist in the Hindi film industry from 1941 to 2000: from his early 
years at Raj Kamal studio with V. Shantaram (when they literally made 
their own make-up) to his 17 years spent at the Filmistan studio. There 
is a sharper focus on the 1960’s - when he predominantly worked with 
Shammi Kapoor, Asha Parekh, Sadhana & Saira Banu. It also documents film 
history from the point of view of a technician who might lacquer it with 
his own stories. It is finally, a tribute to a grandfather who narrated 
stories of his everyday life, not knowing that stories often become 
history.

The research is primarily through interviews. The presentation will be 
in an audio-visual form with a written essay.

Anuja Ghosalkar (anu.ghosalkar @gmail.com) is a lecturer and researcher 
in film and has been involved with an experimental theatre group in 
Mumbai for over half a decade. She is currently working with 
Breakthrough – a globally active human rights organization. Her project 
blog can be found at: http://www.papaajoba.blogspot.com/


Renee C. Lulam and Julius L. Basaiawmoit
Changing Faces of Democratic Spaces in Urban Cosmopolitan Shillong

Understanding personal events as profoundly social allows a broader 
perception of human interactions that have shaped the past and continue 
into the present. As the research progresses and we meet more people 
sharing their versions of ‘cosmopolitan’, we find that the backdrop we 
initially placed the research against has often proven inadequate and 
therefore challenging.

In one of the testimonies, Shillong has been called an ‘artifact of 
British administration….artificial…’ The place and people are variously 
known to have been tolerant, narrow, short sighted, confused, but most 
of all, absorbent. Our intention through this research is to explore the 
different ways Shillong considers ‘cosmopolitan’.
We were fortunate that in the course of our research, an event like the 
Indian Idol contest took place, evoking an almost ‘patriotic’ fervour 
over the finalist from Shillong. Many have quoted it as an example of 
how Shillong has progressed in cosmopolitan tolerance, though much of it 
was driven by emotion and tended towards the superficial and 
reactionary, in the observation of some others.

Through excerpts of audio interviews, video clips, newspaper or journal 
articles, photographs, city soundscapes, and an interpretative paper, we 
will attempt to present a picture of the changing faces of Shillong 
vis-à-vis the term ‘cosmopolitan’.

Julius Basaiawmoit (lemiwell @hotmail.com) specializes in sound for film 
and television. Renee Lulam (renee75 @gmail.com) works with independent 
research based projects. Both are from Shillong.


Sugata Nandi
Eventful Adolescence, Memorable Youth: The Politics of Personal 
Reminiscence in Calcutta, 1947-1967

Personal reminisces of the adolescents and youths of the 1950s and 1960s 
in Kolkata, of specific incidents listed above will be gathered through 
interviews with them. The oral data thus gathered will constitute the 
primary source for constructing a collage of remembered experiences. The 
project will treat the same as texts authored by individuals who 
endeavour to locate and to interpret through the emotional performance 
of remembering what may be termed as significant episodes in the recent 
history of the city.

The project, on completion of research, will be given the shape of a 
academic history paper. At the moment I have fixed the target of writing 
the paper in about 15 thousand words, which might have to be increased 
if required. As of now I have planned to record (in audio cassettes) the 
interviews that will constitute the archival text for the work, if 
resources permit then I would try to make audio-visual record of the 
interviews.

Sugata Nandi (largestriver @hotmail.com) is Lecturer in History, 
Krishnagar Government College, West Bengal


12.15 – 1.15
Proving Residence
Chair: Shveta Sarda
[Shveta Sarda (shveta @sarai.net) is a content editor and translator 
with Sarai. She works in Cybermohalla as a process chronicler and edits 
the labs' content for diverse circulation – books, website, blogs, 
broadsheets, and wall magazines. At present she is working with the 
various research projects at the CM mobile lab. She was part of the 
editorial collective of the broadsheet series Sarai.txt.]

Ajit K. Dwivedi
Sealing ke Nazar Mein: Sealing Banam Pusta ka Visthapan (Media Study: 
Comparative Reporting on Land Ceilings and Displacement from Jamuna Pushta)

Ajit K. Dwivedi (dajeet @gmail.com) is a career journalist. He just left 
Dainik Bhaskar to join ITV News as Associate Editor.

Bipul K. Pandey
The Residence Proof

Bipul Pandey (bipulpandey @gmail.com) worked in print media for nine 
years. He currently works with Star News as Associate Producer.


1.30 pm – 2.30 pm
Sub-metropolitan Dreams
Chair: Iram Ghufran

[Iram Ghufran (iram @sarai.net) is trained as a media practitioner and 
works as video/ audio editor in Sarai Media Lab. She has co-researched 
the work culture of call centres, and is part of the editorial 
collective of the broadsheet series Sarai.txt. She works on various 
multimedia, video and audio works produced at Sarai.]

Nalin Narain Mathur
B-Grade Engineering College Culture

Being subjected with the experience of studying at an engineering 
college, I happened to witness the living experiences, aspirations and 
values that make an 'engineer' beyond all the techy stuff he learns in 
the classroom. Add to it the different background and identity of 
students and the acute realization that "This – is- not – IIT", which 
more often then not looms large in everyone's conscience. Hence, 
engineering colleges constitute of interesting and fantastical cultural 
dynamics wherein a mix of identities, cultures and aspirations are 
played out in non-metropolitan spaces to get an amalgamation of 
different worlds in one campus. Through this project I aim to study the 
phase of social and emotional renaissance which unavoidably crops up 
during one's stay away from his natural locale.

Nalin Narain Mathur (nalin.mathur @gmail.com) works as a systems 
analyst. He has a Bachelor’s Degree in Mechanical Engineering from Uttar 
Pradesh Technical University, Lucknow.


Syed Zaigham Imam
Sapno ke Rail (The Train of Dreams: Narratives from the 
Allahabad-Jaunpur Passenger Train): a short documentary film

If faster trains denote speed and arrival, slower trains can sometimes 
nurture dreams that compress a lifetime into a few hours. Zaigham’s 
project is to study how students, literally, arrive at Allahabad. The 
passenger trains, so called because they stop at even the smallest of 
stations connecting Allahabad (the educational headquarters of Northern 
India) to Jaunpur and Faizabad, two towns in the hinterland and 
encompassing other smaller towns such as Pratapgarh, Mau and Aimma. 
Sixty percent of the people travelling in these trains are students on 
their way to Allahabad. Not so much to enroll at the university but to 
join one of the innumerable coaching centres and to prepare for the 
Central and Provincial Civil Services Exams. In the seventies and 
eighties, students from Allahabad dominated the civil service 
selections, not only at the centre, but also in states such as UP, 
Bihar, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh. The sons mainly of farmers, who 
travelled out of the smaller qasbas chasing a dream, even came to be 
known as ‘collectors.’

What does the inside of these trains look like? Zaigham travels up and 
down the ravaged trains with missing bulbs, fans and fittings and 
investigates peculiarities like ACP, a short form for alarm chain 
pulling. People use it to stop the train at convenient points, an 
illegal practice that is stoically accepted by the authorities, and most 
travel ticket-less. The towns and stations falling on the way represent 
the rise and fall of the qasbas of UP, like Mau Aimma which is an 
important production centre for crackers. The story of these trains is 
also a metaphor for the democratisation of higher education that took 
place in the last three decades of the twentieth century. Through 
interviews with passengers and train officials, and unsuccessful 
attempts to get information through the Right to Information Act, 
Zaigham builds a picture of slow development and the aspiration for a 
government job that is primary, on the poor students all over India.

Trained as a journalist, Zaigham Imam (zaighamimam @rediffmail.com) also 
writes fiction and is currently trying his hand at filmmaking. He left 
Amar Ujala recently to work with BAG films. The project is blogged at: 
http://www.merirail.blogspot.com/


2.45 – 4.15
Hearing Spaces, Seeing Spaces
Chair: Aarti Sethi
[Aarti Sethi (aarti.sethi @gmail.com) previously worked with the Sarai 
Programme; currently she is pursuing her M.Phil in Film Studies at the 
School of Arts and Aesthetics, JNU.]

Shahnawaz Khan
Entertainment Ghosts in Srinagar: A Tale of Cinema Halls in the City

This study aims to analyse the impact of the closure of cinema halls in 
Srinagar after the outbreak of armed insurgency in early nineties. Most 
of the closed cinema halls are occupied by paramilitary troopers and 
have even functioned as torture centres in the nineties. Some others 
have changed business. Only one is functional, but not in good condition.

Shahnawaz talks to people associated with the trade, cine goers who have 
been to these halls when they functioned, and the youth today who do not 
find a place to go for a movie in the city.

The study also looks at the psychological impact of these structures in 
the city, which stand witness to the times they have gone through.

Shahnawaz Khan (fsrnkashmir @gmail.com) is a journalist based in 
Srinagar, associated with the US based Free Speech Radio News. Along 
with some friends he launched Kashmirnewz.com in 2006.


Zubin Pastakia
A Photographic Study of Bombay’s Cinema Halls

The project seeks to photographically examine the cultural experience of 
different types of cinema halls in Bombay city.

In part, this is a meditation on different urban spaces. More 
importantly, this is an attempt to illustrate the subjective nature of 
the film-going experience. From the designer shop - to cinema hall - to 
chain restaurant mall/multiplex experience, to the still-standing 
single-screen bastions of the art-deco era, to the musty largely 
male-dominated "c-grade" halls, the photographs will evoke the unique 
experience of these different spaces.

The intention is to eventually produce a monograph on Bombay's cinema 
halls as well as to exhibit the photographs publicly.

Zubin Pastakia (zubinpastakia @gmail.com) is a photographer and 
filmmaker living in Bombay. He blogs his photos at: 
http://peripheralvision.blogspot.com/


Sayandeb Mukherjee
Corridors: An Exploration of Sound and Space

This project delves into the emotional and acoustic contours of 
corridors. This contemporary architectural design which may appear 
simple structurally possesses a complicated and sometimes convoluted 
auditory space due to reflective and diffractive properties of sound. 
The project attempts to enlighten the variability of these acoustic 
qualities/characterestics of corridors integrated in different urban spaces.

The process of research includes a vivid physical involvement and 
exploration in the corridor like spaces, taking notes in a descriptive 
way in the spot itself, acquiring photographs and live recordings of the 
acoustic environments at different spots of the same space. The 
recording process may also involve time stamps (i.e. recordings of the 
same space over the different parts of a day) for the analysis of the 
soundscape in a particular space. The process also includes the 
collection of films, texts or any other form of art, where one can 
notice a conscious application of such corridor-like spaces.

Sayandeb Mukherjee (sayandebmukherjee @yahoo.co.in) is a graduate of the 
Satyajit Ray Film and Television Institute in Kolkata who now works as a 
professional sound recordist in Ramoji Film City, Hyderabad.


4.30—6.30 pm
Special Panel: The Past of Research and the Present of Practice

Featuring: TP Sabitha, Yousuf Saeed, Mahmood Farooqui and Rahaab Allana
Discussant: Shuddhabrata Sengupta

How might a detailed study of the past, dredging and building archives, 
serve not just to make museums, but invigorate and change our sense of 
the present, feed directly into practice? The panelists, who are all 
former Sarai-CSDS Independent Fellows, are all people whose research has 
engaged deeply with the archive, with documents and images from the 
past. At the same time, as performers, writers, photographers, and 
filmmakers they are also people who work with and produce highly 
contemporary forms.

TP Sabitha (sabitha_tp @yahoo.co.uk) is a writer who writes in both 
Malayalam and English, as well as a teacher and researcher of literature 
and art.

Yousuf Saeed (ysaeed7 @yahoo.com) is a filmmaker and writer in Urdu and 
English. He is currently associated with a new archival initiative for 
visual culture, TasveerGhar.

Mahmood Farooqui (mahmood @sarai.net) is a historian and performance 
artist. He works with the Independent Fellowship programme and with the 
translation and editing of Hindi publications at Sarai.

Rahaab Allana (rahaab @acparchives.com) currently works as a curator for 
the Alkazi Foundation for Photography.

Shuddhabrata Sengupta (shuddha @sarai.net) is a writer, columnist and 
media practitioner with training in sociology and filmmaking. He is one 
of the co-initiators of Sarai, one of the editors of the Sarai Reader 
series and a member of the Raqs Media Collective. He has contributed 
numerous scholarly and popular articles in newspapers, magazines, 
journals, anthologies and books on a range of themes. He coordinates the 
distributed research network at Sarai.

7.00—7.30
(In Upstairs Gallery Space)
Performance Art: “This Evening Too: From Lal Ded to Abdul Ahad Zargar”
by Inder Salim: Space limited to 25 persons only—first come, first serve.

Inder Salim (indersalim @gmail.com), an Independent Fellow this year, is 
a performance artist based in Delhi. He blogs his work at: 
http://indersalim.livejournal.com/




Wed 5 December
Venue: LTG Auditorium, Mandi House

10.00 am – 11.30
Distant Communities
Chair: Ravikant
[Ravikant (ravikant @sarai.net) taught and researched history in Delhi 
University for a number of years. He currently conceptualises and edits 
content in Hindi at Sarai. He is the co-editor of Deewan-e-Sarai (the 
Hindi Reader series). He also writes for Hindi magazines and newspapers 
on the issues of media, language, computing and translation.]

Surya Prakash Upadhyay
Guru on the Air: Televised Hinduism in Contemporary India

The project proposes to look at the instrumentality of audio-visual 
media in the construction and maintenance of the religio-spiritual world 
in contemporary Hinduism and in the mobilization of people towards 
“tele-gurus”. The project attempts to look into a recent and interesting 
addition in the religious sphere, especially in present-day Hinduism, 
catered to the people by cable television in the urban spaces. It looks 
at a new-age guru named Asharam Bapu, and at the phenomenon of media 
playing a vital part in the growth of his organization, in increasing 
the numbers of followers and devotees, and in propagation as well as 
spread of religiosity and spirituality among people. There are several 
gurus and also several devotional channels that are highly influential 
in urban spaces, transmitting their programmes through television and 
providing an opportunity for people to listen and watch their favorite 
guru. This development in the media sector has filled the gap of 
physical absence of the guru and multiplied the communication between 
him and his followers. The aim of the research is to give a ‘thick 
description’ of the whole phenomenon.

Surya Prakash Upadhyay (surya_rajan21 @yahoo.com) is a Research Scholar 
in the Dept of Humanities and Social Sciences, Indian Institute of 
Technology Bombay.

Neelima Chauhan
Blogit Hindi Jati ka Linkit Man: Blogon mein Hindi Hypertext ka 
Adhayayan (The World of Hindi Blogs)

This research attempts to do an online study of Hindi hyper text on 
Hindi blogs. It will be an attempt to make a critical appreciation of 
Language and style of hypertextual prose as it flows through the 
terminals of Hindi Bloggers. It will be an online study which will take 
in account the existing blogs, Hindi Networks, Blog Archives, Comments 
etc. Narratives from the Hindi Online community will be collected. The 
objective is to identify the construction of the grand narrative of 
'Hindi Jati' (Hindi nationality) as described in Hindi literary 
criticism, especially that by Ram Vilas Sharma. This construction of 
Hindi Jati where geographical space seemingly becomes meaningless (or 
less important, at least) will be explored. As the research will be an 
online study, its progress will be available to all interested in real 
time.

Neelima Chauhan (neelimasayshi @gmail.com)'s doctoral and postdoctoral 
work is in post-colonial Hindi prose. She teaches Hindi at Delhi 
University's Zakir Husain Post Graduate Evening College. The blog for 
this project can be found at: http://linkitmann.blogspot.com/

Raman Jit Singh Chima
The Regulation of the Internet by the Indian State

Though considerable work has been done on exploring how the Internet is 
capable of being regulated, not much has been done to chart out the 
exact shape of such regulation of expression on the Internet in India. 
More importantly, the exact manner in which the Indian State has 
regulated the Internet through all the structures and mechanisms at its 
disposal has not been studied, which is important since this affects the 
flow of speech and expression.

In order to attempt to chart out the empirical aspects of Internet 
regulation in India and its linkages with normative frameworks, the 
focus of this project is thus on the following two goals:

firstly, to track out and study the manner in which the Indian State 
regulates the Internet through legal structures and connected mechanism 
(both through formal legal rules as well as through informal measure 
such as executive action); and

secondly, to analyze how this regulatory framework relates to the 
constitutional safeguards with respect to the limitations on state 
action viz. free speech and expression and whether it respects these 
constraints.

Raman Chima (ramanchima @gmail.com) is pursuing the B.A.LL.B. (Hons) 
program at the National Law School of India University, Bangalore and is 
currently in the 3rd year of this course. The blog for this project can 
be found at: http://stateoftheweb.blogspot.com/


11.45 – 1.15
In the Midst of Conflict I: Looking Back and Looking Ahead
Chair: Ravi Sundaram

[Ravi Sundaram (ravis @sarai.net) is a Fellow of the Centre for the 
Study of Developing Societies. He is one of the initiators of Sarai and 
is one of the editors of the Sarai Reader series. He coordinates the 
media city research project. He has written extensively on contemporary 
intersection of technology, media and urban experience.]


Arvind Kumar
Caste Violence in Urban Maharashtra: A study of the 1974 Worli Riots in 
Mumbai and the Dalit Panthers Movement

The proposed study intends to analyse the Worli riots of 1974 when there 
was a violent clash between the Shiv Sena and the Dalit Panthers. In 
this riot the main target of communal wrath were dalits who opted out of 
the oppressive caste-hindu religion and converted to Neo-Buddhism. The 
riots and the agitation brought to the surface dissensions within the 
Dalit Panther movement, which ultimately led to its split in 1974.

There are enough sources available on Dalit Panther movement. The 
consciousness of revolt was also expressed in an outburst of poetry by 
new writers like Namdev Dhasal, Daya Powar, J V Pawar, Waman Nimbalkar, 
Arun Kamble and many others. The present study will locate the Worli 
riots in a historical perspective and will try and address new questions 
as and when they arise through the course of the study.

Arvind Kumar (arvind.access @gmail.com) is pursuing a PhD in American 
Studies at the School of International Studies, JNU on the topic 
'Discrimination and Resistance - A Comparative Study of Black Movements 
in the U.S and Dalit Movements in India'.

P. Jenny and C. Christy
Chitralekha’s Burning Autorickshaw: Caste, Class and Gender in the Urban 
Space of Keralam

This proposal is about a Dalit woman married to a Backward Caste man and 
their struggle to move above caste and gender structures in a moffusil 
town in Keralam.

The story begins when the couple buys an autorickshaw in Chithra Lekha's 
name and she decides to drive it herself. However, Chithra Lekha's caste 
and gender identity makes it impossible for her to step into the public 
sphere of this liberated moffusil town. The leftist trade union (mainly 
consisting of a dominant BC caste) already angered by her caste 
violation of marrying above her caste, acts against her by delaying her 
membership card and continues to harass her till at last her 
autorickshaw is burned to ashes.

In this project we collect and document each and every aspect of this 
(true) incident by conducting thorough interviews with all the people 
concerned. Along with this we would also like to produce a theoretical 
paper which tries to understand how caste, class, gender relations 
constitute the urban space in Keralam. Here we would examine:

 > how the dominant Marxist party works to reproduce the caste and 
gender structure in Keralam;

 > the important tools of sexual morality which are used against the 
progress of Dalit and "other" women;

 > the intricacies of the OBC-Dalit relationship and the reasons that 
triggers violence between them;

 > the role of subaltern masculinities in the entire incident.


P. Jenny (jenny.chithra @gmail.com) is an independent researcher, writer 
and columnist. She holds a PhD on Malayalam Cinema, from the Central 
Institute of English and Foreign Languages, Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh.

C. Christy (christy.carmel @gmail.com) is at present doing her PhD in 
Media and Commmunications from the Central University of Hyderabad, 
Andhra Pradesh.


Meena Menon
Recovering Lost Histories: Riot Victims, the Communal Polarisation of 
Mumbai and Its Impact on People and Perceptions about Communities

Is Mumbai the unbreakable city it is touted to be? As a city, it has 
changed in obvious and not so obvious ways since the post Babri Masjid 
demolition riots of December 1992 and January 1993. The main focus of 
the research will be the families of the riot victims and their lives 
after more than a decade since the violence.

The research is based on interviews first hand visits to places and 
talking to as wide a spectrum of people as possible— including 
researchers, journalists, riot affected families, government, police 
officials, apart from political parties. At the end of the research I 
would like to use the material for a book.

Meena Menon (meenamenon @gmail.com) is currently a special correspondent 
with The Hindu. She has been a journalist for 22 years and has worked 
with The Times of India, Mid-day and the United of News of India.

11.00 – 11.30
(In Upstairs Gallery Space)
Listen, Little Man-- by Madhavi Tangella;
[See also discussion with Shivam Vij on Friday’s programme below.]

Listen Little Man is a 28-minute documentary film study of ragging in India.

Madhavi Tangella (manzilechar @yahoo.com) worked on Sagar Cinema, a 
“poor man’s multiplex” for her Sarai Independent Fellowship. She is 
currently a film student at SRFTI, Kolkata.



1.30 – 3.00
In the Midst of Conflict II: Reading Between the Column Inches
Chair: Sanjay Sharma
[Sanjay Sharma (sanjaykusharma @yahoo.co.in) is a historian and radio 
broadcaster. He teaches History at Zakir Hussain College, Delhi 
University and is co-editor of Sarai-CSDS’s Hindi reader series, 
Deewan-e-Sarai.]


Shiju Sam Varughese
The Public Sphere as a Site of Knowledge Production: Science in the 
Malayalam Press

This study attempts to understand the functioning of the public sphere, 
constituted through the regional press in Keralam, as a site of 
knowledge production in the context of scientific controversies. This 
will be studied by taking a specific scientific controversy as case. In 
the wake of an earthquake on 12th December 2000, several unusual 
geophysical incidents including well collapses, coloured rains and micro 
tremors began appearing in Keralam. These phenomena have been reported 
in the regional press from every nook and cranny of the region and the 
deliberations over it continued for almost one year in the regional 
press, involving a wide range of issues and actors. This case will be 
studied in detail based on content analysis of five major Malayalam 
newspapers (Malayala Manorama, Mathrubhumi, Deshabhimani, Madhyamam, and 
Keralam Kaumudi) as well as interviews with key actors involved in the 
controversy. This is to demonstrate how the public sphere acts as a site 
of knowledge production in the context of a scientific controversy.

Shiju Sam Varughese (shijusam @gmail.com)is a doctoral candidate at the 
Zakir Husain Centre for Educational Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru 
University, New Delhi. His research is on the public understanding of 
science in Keralam.

Alok Puranik
Bazaar Reporting in Hindi Newspapers

In the days when the Sensex is a mandatory presence in news reporting, 
Alok Puranik tried to study reportage of the market in Hindi newspapers 
down the years. When did these market reports originate, how did its 
terminology evolve, what was its relationship with the rest of the news 
and how has it changed over the years? He starts his study in 1947 and 
concentrates on two dailies published from Delhi.

Alok Puranik (puranika @gmail.com) is an economist, columnist, satirist, 
and blogger who teaches at Agrasen College, Delhi University. His books 
include Neki kar Akhbar mein Daal and Arthik Patrakarita.

Shubhra Nagalia
The Representation of Communal Conflicts in Hindi Media: A Case study of 
the 2005 Mau Riots

The research investigates the reportage of Mau riots by electronic and 
print media. While there has been extensive documentation and studies on 
the ‘communalisation’ of media and its role in riot situations, the 
small town manifestation of this phenomenon in Mau and its resultant 
repercussions on hegemonic discourses and construction of religious 
identity will be one of the areas of our study. The images, slogans, 
language and presentation of Mau riots through the lens of Hindi media; 
linkages between political influences, capital and communities that 
shapes the contours of media in general and local news in particular 
will also be subjects of our research. The paper also contains detailed 
interview excerpts.


Shubhra Nagalia (shubhra_n71 @yahoo.com) is doing her Ph.D in the School 
of International Studies, JNU. She has taught Women’s Studies at Mahatma 
Gandhi University, Wardha. She is a longtime activist and a member of 
All India Progressive Womens’ Association.


3.15—4.45
Other Traditions
Chair: Priya Sen
[Priya Sen is a trained filmmaker who has taught media production in the 
US and India. She works with sound, multimedia and radio content at the 
Cybermohalla Labs. She is part of the editorial collective of the 
broadsheet series Sarai.txt.]

Priya Babu
Traditions of the Aravani (Transgender) Community in Tamilnadu

Aravanis, called Hijrahs in north India, have existed in Tamilnadu for 
several centuries. Though born biologically as males, they closely 
identify themselves as girl/woman. By doing so, they undergo a lot of 
suffering due to the great psychological pressure exerted by different 
social forces that prevail. Because of lack of understanding among the 
general public and the society, those who do not behave like boys are 
often discrimination and even face violence from their own family 
members. Hence they are forced to leave their family members and later 
join the Aravani community, which accepts them and provides support.

This research will study and document the Tamilnadu Aravani community’s 
varied traditions. It will try to understand different sects and their 
hierarchies with a focus on interrelations during public celebrations 
and private gatherings. In the process, the project will also document 
their worshipping places, their relation with the god Aravan and the 
story of how they became linked with mainstream society.

Priya Babu (priyababu_sudar @yahoo.co.in) is a Chennai-based researcher, 
journalist and coordinator of the theatre group, ‘Kannadi Kalai Kuzhu’. 
She is herself a member of the Aravani community.


Mithun Narayan Bose
Tracing Life from the Stroke: Documenting the Rickshaw-Painting of 
Kolkata Streets

The paintings behind the rickshaws of the city of Calcutta are a unique 
example of an unnoticed urban folk-art, and the detailed study of the 
paintings can be an alternative way to know about the life of these 
people. As most of the Calcutta rickshaw-pullers have migrated to the 
city from other places, the paintings’ style reflect the form/ style of 
art available at the rickshaw-puller’s place of origin. A unique 
heterogeneity is also observed due to its confluence with the urban 
style. Thematically, the rickshaw paintings of Calcutta-streets are of 
different types (e.g. religious, landscape, portrait of near and dear 
ones, film star etc.). In this project, the painting behind the 
rickshaws is documented with the help of both video recording and 
photography.

Mithun Narayan Bose (bangali_mnb @yahoo.com) is a language teacher at a 
Kolkata school. He contributes regularly to several Kolkata little 
magazines, and his interests include poetry, folklore, cultural 
anthropology, art and art criticism.

Deepak Kadyan
Popular Musical Traditions and Configuration of Jat identity in Haryana, 
1900-2000

This research seeks to examine the relationship between popular musical 
traditions and the forging of a jat identity in north India in general 
and in Haryana in particular. The processes of identity formation and 
self-perceived notions of community are analyzed and discerned through 
the prism of popular culture and as to how a 'community' viewed itself, 
and what its aspirations have been over a period of time.

An important aspect of this study is an analysis of the sites of 
performance and circulation of this oral tradition. One such site is the 
akharas (lit. a wrestling arena, but here, it refers to a space for 
rehearsals and practice), influential until the mid twentieth century. 
Another such site available to oral tradition for circulation was the 
colonial army and police. The history of oral tradition is intertwined 
with the history of prominent performers, and major structural and 
performative changes, whether in terms of musical instruments, rhythms, 
intonation, appropriation of symbols or content— in other words, the 
relationship between performers and performance. Interestingly, the 
social composition of oral tradition in Haryana is different, as it 
wasn't dominated by any particular community.

Deepak Kadyan can be reached at: hie.deepak at gmail.com


5.30 – 6.00 pm
(In Upstairs Gallery Space)
Performance Art: “This Evening Too: From Lal Ded to Abdul Ahad Zargar”
by Inder Salim: Space limited to 25 persons only—first come, first serve.

Inder Salim (indersalim @gmail.com), an Independent Fellow this year, is 
a performance artist based in Delhi. He blogs his work at: 
http://indersalim.livejournal.com/


7.00 – 8.15
(Back in main auditorium)
“Creeper”, a play written and directed by Ram Ganesh Kamatham, recasting 
the Vikram and Vetal myth in a contemporary urban setting. Featuring 
Mallika Prasad and Abhishek Majumdar. (Running time: 1 hour fifteen 
minutes)


"Shit!"
"What?"
"Some kid fell off an escalator in Garuda mall and died."
"It's ok, it's ok. As long as it's not someone we know. Just someone 
else's kid."
"How can they let this happen? People must be allowed to go shopping in 
peace."

About the play

This is a story about two people in the city.
She is the expert narrator, he is a mischievous sutradhar.
These two story-tellers have amazing stories to share.
Problem is they don't agree on how to tell the story!

Creeper is a modern re-imagination of the tale of Vikram and Vetal. The 
play slams this mythos into a contemporary urban setting – creating a 
shadowy world that is immediately recognizable, yet bizarre and 
entertaining.

“Creeper” was written and produced as part of Ram Ganesh Kamatham’s 
project on Vikram and Vetal during the 2007 Sarai-CSDS Independent 
Fellowship. Kamatham, one of Bangalore’s best known up-and-coming 
directors (ramganeshk @gmail.com) has created work for stage, film, 
radio, and video games. The project is blogged at: 
http://addledbraindump.blogspot.com/


Thurs 6 December
Venue: LTG Auditorium, Mandi House

10.00 am – 11.30
Medicine and Modernity
Chair: Awadhendra Sharan

Gyaltsen Lama
Shamans in Gangtok: A Graphic Novel

A four part graphic novel exploring the lives of four different shamans 
in Gangtok, Sikkim. 20 pages of each part with black and white 
illustrations. Each part is approached with different illustration and 
narrative styles.

Gyaltsen Lama (gyaltsenlama @gmail.com) received his bachelor of fine 
arts degree in 2000 from the Sir JJ School of Art, Mumbai. He is 
currently the fine arts teacher at the Tashi Namgyal Academy, Gangtok. 
Photographs, interview transcripts, pages from the novel and videos for 
this project are uploaded at: http://www.etattoo7.com/sarai/home.html

M.S. Harilal
Adopting Modernisation and Negotiating Modernisation: Placing Modern and 
Traditional Ayurvedic Sectors in the Context of Transformation

The study endeavors to analyze responses of the larger transformation of 
a traditional medical system, namely Ayurveda, to a more affirmative 
institutional system and a well developed market. The modern forms of 
Ayurveda seem to be pulled by both pharmaceutical companies and modern 
practitioners in a direction that flaunts cultural authenticity and 
tradition as well as scientific efficacy and standardization for its 
products. It analyses how the stakeholders in this bifurcation - 
traditional and modern ayurvedic manufacturing, perceive and deal with 
modernization, which is two fold, both in form and content. The two 
specific questions that the study intends to explore, based on selected 
case analysis and necessary ethnographic works, are: one, How do we 
explain the recent gains made by many firms operating in the 'modern' 
sector? Two, what are the ways in which the traditional-informal sector 
has coped with the processes of transformation? To the gist, we are 
addressing the question of agential relation in the transformation and 
want to contrast and compare how the two sections deal with the 
challenge of globalization or negotiate to find their space in the 
global era. Three rationales may be given for this study: one, the 
traditional knowledge systems are increasingly become relevant, two, 
there is a universal concern to addressing community ownership of 
traditional knowledge and third, it will help us understand the struggle 
and revival of similarly placed traditional industries.

M.S. Harilal (harilalms @gmail.com) is, at present, a doctoral scholar 
in Economics at the Centre for Development Studies, Thiruvananthapuram. 
His current areas of interests are the modernization of Indian systems 
of medicine, the medicinal plants sector, IPR and traditional knowledge.


Burton Cleetus
Urbanisation, Western Medicine and Modernity: The Rockefeller Foundation 
in Travancore

One of the most important interventions made by the “progressive” state 
of Travancore which later became part of the state of Kerala, was in the 
field of health care. The reorganization of the public health department 
with the aid of the Rockefeller Foundation of the United States was 
aimed at drafting a coherent health care policy for the state, primarily 
to cater to the needs of the emerging population in the urban centres. 
The study seeks to argue that the process of reconstituting the health 
care policy by the princely state in the early twentieth century was a 
political project of governance aimed at socio-cultural framing. A 
comparison between activities of the Rockefeller foundation in 
addressing the spread of malaria and plague in the early twentieth 
century with the attempts made by the state of Kerala in tackling 
similar contagious diseases in recent times would enable to one 
understand the shifts in the frames of references of the nature of 
interventions of western medicine over the last century.

Burton Cleetus (burtoncleetus @yahoo.co.uk) is a PhD scholar from the 
Center for Historical Studies, JNU. He did his post graduation and M 
Phil from JNU. His research on the institutionalization of indigenous 
medicine in Kerala is an attempt to explore as to how esoteric cultural 
practices and localized healing techniques were refashioned, revitalized 
and consequently institutionalized into the broad framework of Ayurveda.

11.00 – 11.30
(In Upstairs Gallery Space)
Short film on ragging—Listen, Little Man-- by Madhavi Tangella; see also 
discussion with Shivam Vij on Friday’s programme below.

Madhavi Tangella (manzilechar @yahoo.com) worked on Sagar Cinema, a 
“poor man’s multiplex” for her Sarai Independent Fellowship. She is 
currently a film student at SRFTI, Kolkata.

11.45 – 12.45
Two Views of the Changing Industrial Landscape
(short documentary films & discussion)
Chair: Jeebesh Bagchi

Ranu Ghosh
The Story of a Laid-off Worker’s Resistance to Eviction in Kolkata

I have been following the transformation of a productive, half a century 
old Jay Engineering Works into Kolkata’s South City Project, “Eastern 
India's largest mixed use real estate development”. Jay Engineering, 
commonly called Usha Factory, started operations manufacturing 
electrical consumer durables in the 1950s. The labour force of this 
reasonably large manufacturing unit was mostly comprised of migrants 
from Bihar and UP, and refugees from East Pakistan. The Works was closed 
down, made defunct and the land was handed over to the real estate 
consortium of five major real estate “magnates” in 2003. The factory 
buildings were demolished and the construction of the South City 
Projects comprising three 35-storey and one 28-storey tower, a shopping 
mall, school, multiplex, club etc, started from February 2004, which 
included the illegal filling up of one of south Calcutta's largest 
natural water bodies. The workers of Jay were forced into retirement 
with little or no compensation and sent into limbo, except for Shambhu 
Prasad Singh. Shambhu has refused to opt for the meagre handouts and has 
instead taken his case to court. Against all odds, and withstanding the 
sustained pressure of the builders, he continues to live in his original 
quarters, surrounded and dwarfed on all sides by the construction in 
progress of South City. This brave stand taken by an individual is an 
example of how such “development” can be challenged.

Since the latter half of 2004 I have been documenting in video and still 
formats, the stages of development at the construction site as the work 
progressed and the displaced labour force, and out of that, Shambhu 
Prasad evolved as an outstanding example of the protest against this 
“development”. I began to follow his everyday life, his improvised 
strategies of survival in the face of difficult circumstances and his 
innate zeal to fight for his rights. He has transformed from a character 
in my film into that of a collaborator, adding a unique dimension to the 
project.

Ranu Ghosh (ghosh.ranu @gmail.com)has worked as a freelance camera 
person and director in the Indian industry for the past eight years.

T. Venkat and Meghna Sukumar
Building the Indian Dream: Living and Working Conditions of Migrant 
Workers on Chennai's IT Corridor

Cities in this country have been promoting huge infrastructural projects 
in their attempt to redefine themselves to the age of globalisation. The 
6 lane express way, christened the IT corridor, along with the luxurious 
industrial, commercial and residential complexes are part of Chennai 
city’s attempt to create a global image. Thus to the people of the city 
it is an image, a dream and an opportunity for change and 
transformation. To the migrant construction workers it is undeniably an 
opportunity with enormous economic prospects, but in what ways does it 
transform their lives? What hope does it hold out for them? What image 
does it create in them? What is their stake in it?

Presented through a short documentary film, our research delves into the 
aspirations of the workers, and their imageries of the creature they are 
building. It enquires into the change and transformation that this grand 
project has brought to their lives.

T. Venkata Naga Narasimhan, alias Venkat (venkatt2k @gmail.com), is a 
post graduate in sociology from the University of Madras. He joined as 
research assistant to Dr. Karen Coelho (an earlier Sarai Independent 
Fellow and asst professor at Madras Institute of Development Studies) on 
a project titled “Neighbourhood Associations as Urban Collective Actors: 
a comparative study of Bangalore and Chennai” in the year 2006-07.


1pm – 2pm
Tracking Literatures
Chair: Ravikant

Rajiv Ranjan Giri
Saraswati ki Sarvajanik Duniya, 1900-1920 (The Popular World of the 
Journal Saraswati, 1900-1920)

Rajiv Ranjan Giri has published extensively on the history of Hindi. He 
co-edits a Hindi journal called Samved. He can be reached at: 
rajeevgirijnu @rediffmail.com .

Gopal Ji Pradhan
Hindi mein Uttar Purv (The North-east in Hindi Literature)

Gopal Ji Pradhan is a writer and activist. He teaches Hindi at Assam 
University, Silchar and can be reached at: gopaljeepradhan @rediffmail.com .

2.15 –4.15
Special Panel: Where Does Research Go?
Featuring: Zainab Bawa, Parismita Singh, Madhavi Tangella and Prasad 
Shetty.
Discussant: Vivek Narayanan.

If research really did proceed as it plans to do, time after time, in 
the bright, overdeterminate clarity of good proposals, asking direct 
questions and receiving exact answers, this would not be saying very 
much for the richness or depth of our lives, our social and built 
structures and knotted networks! Instead, we wander, we diverge, we 
rethink, we scratch out, we revisit: the strength of research is not in 
the attempt to control the world’s material but in questions leading to 
new questions, that is, in the ability to stay alert while the ground 
unexpectedly shifts under us. In this panel, we ask four previous 
Independent Fellows to look back on their fellowship research, 
considering the ways they have been led to unexpected conclusions, new 
projects, critiques of what they were doing in the first instance, and 
revisitings of the original site of research to find it changed. How 
does research evolve, and what kinds of other projects does it lead to?

Prasad Shetty (askshetty @rediffmail.com) is an architect and urban 
planner. He is a founding member of CRIT (Collective Research 
Initiatives Trust), Mumbai.

Parismita Singh (parismitasingh @yahoo.com) is finishing her first 
graphic novel, due in 2008.

Zainab Bawa (zainabbawa @yahoo.com) talks her walks through a world of 
words on her infrequently updated blog www.xanga.com/citybytes.

Madhavi Tangella (manzilechar @yahoo.com) is currently a film student at 
SRFTI.

Vivek Narayanan (vivek @sarai.net) co-coordinates the Independent 
Fellowship programme for Sarai and writes, mostly poetry and some 
fiction. He is Consulting Editor for the web-based literary journal, 
Almost Island and an Associate Editor for the Boston-based international 
poetry annual, Fulcrum. His first book of poems appeared last year.


4.30 – 6.00 Work In “Progress”: Feature-length video by Debkamal Ganguly
(87 minutes)

Following the trail of a 1932 journey by one key Bengali novelist, 
Bibhutibhushan, the video tries to explore varied ways of interaction of 
'urban-subject' with 'non-urban' forest and plateau-like spaces, close 
to the western border of West Bengal. Selecting Bangla texts as early as 
1872 to as late as 2007, the video tries to articulate the changing 
trajectory of space-emotion, from mythical to self-conscious to sublime 
to existentialist and finally the virtual and hyper-real. The video 
acknowledges the random and arbitrary as an aesthetic function and 
recycles whatever comes along its way.

Debkamal Ganguly (deb99kamal @yahoo.com)’s work as a scriptwriter, film 
and sound editor (including with director Vipin Vijay) has earned him 
some national and international recognition. He pursues this current 
project as a 2007 Sarai-CSDS Associate Fellow.

6.15 – 6.45
(In Upstairs Gallery Space)
Performance Art: “This Evening Too: From Lal Ded to Abdul Ahad Zargar”
by Inder Salim: Space limited to 25 persons only—first come, first serve.

Inder Salim (indersalim @gmail.com), an Independent Fellow this year, is 
a performance artist based in Delhi. He blogs his work at: 
http://indersalim.livejournal.com/


7.15pm – 8pm
Chennai Sabha Drama: An Actor’s Story:
Solo performance by Pritham Chakravarty (running time: 30 mins)

For her 2007 Independent Fellowship project, Pritham Chakravarty 
researched and revisited the lingering artifacts of a scene that she 
herself had been a part of as a child actress: Chennai’s “sabha drama”, 
a semi-amateur subscription theatre scene. Her solo show performance is 
not autobiographical, but is based on a composite reconstruction of 
interviews with actors and others—it draws on Chakravarty’s usual and 
intensive method of designing one-person scripts based on a series of 
interviews, inhabiting the persona of the interviewed.

Pritham K. Chakravarty (prithu7 @hotmail.com) has been a political 
theatre performer and theatre activist based in Chennai for 20 years; 
but her acting debut first came on the Sabha drama stage itself, at the 
age of six.


Fri Dec 7
Venue: LTG Auditorium, Mandi House

10.00 – 11.00
Proofreading: Identity and Publishing
Chair: Mahmood Farooqui

Vijay Kumar Pandey
Meerut ka Prakasan Udyog (The Publishing Industry in Meerut)

The publication industry of Meerut is almost 200 years old. During this 
period the industry has evolved with time and flourished. The present 
turnover of the industry is nearly Rs. 200 crore per annum and provides 
employment to approximately one lakh people.

The study aims at identifying the factors contributing to the rapid 
growth and evolution of this industry in Meerut during past 200 years as 
well as the problems and challenges before it. It will also look into 
how the industry has changed with time.

Vijay Kumar Pandey (vijaykharsh @yahoo.co.in) has been a journalist for 
the last five years. He is currently with Amar Ujala.


Yoginder Sikand & Naseemur Rahman
Islamic Publishing Houses in Delhi

This research project focuses on the Muslim publishing industry in 
Delhi. It examines various aspects of this industry, including content 
of publications and linkages between authors, publishers and consumers 
of the literature produced by these publishing houses. It also looks at 
how the Muslim publishing industry is responding to the various 
challenges that Muslims in India today see themselves faced with.

Naseem ur Rahman (majidee @yahoo.com) is a Ph.D. student at the Jamia 
Millia Islamia and is presently working with the Markazi Maktaba Islami, 
a leading Muslim publishing house in Delhi; and Yoginder Sikand, 
Professor at the Centre for Jawaharlal Nehru Studies, Jamia Millia 
Islamia, New Delhi.

11.00 – 12.15
(In Upstairs Gallery Space)
Side Effects: Collaborations and Conversations Between Independent Fellows.

A documentary film on ragging—Listen, Little Man (28 mins)-- by Madhavi 
Tangella; discussion and commentary by Shivam Vij, who studied ragging 
for his Sarai-CSDS Fellowship.

Introduced and moderated by Iram Ghufran

Madhavi Tangella (manzilechar @yahoo.com) worked on Sagar Cinema, a 
“poor man’s multiplex” for her Sarai Independent Fellowship. She is 
currently a film student at SRFTI, Kolkata.

Shivam Vij (mail @shivamvij.com) is a journalist, blogger, and runs the 
website stopragging.org . His research on the nature of ragging in 
hostels for the Independent Fellowship in 2005 led him to being 
appointed as a consultant to the R.K. Raghavan committee set up by the 
Supreme Court to recommend measures to curb ragging. His journalistic 
interests include caste, social mobility, internet censorship, and 
online communities.

11.15 – 12.15
Maps for Lost Cities
Chair: Shuddhabrata Sengupta

Surojit Sen
The Displacement of Prostitutes: A Tale of Two Cities in Two Centuries

This paper focuses on a satirical text Bodmaes Jobdo (Wicked Punished) 
by Prankrishna Dutta in 1869 on the aftermath of 1868 The Contagious 
Diseases Act XIV. Which the British enforced in April 1869 in order to 
control flesh trade and prevent the brothel-going soldiers from 
contracting venereal diseases. The Act made it mandatory for the 
prostitutes to register their names and undergo medical examination and 
treatment ( if necessary ). While the police used the legislation as a 
ploy to harass the prostitutes, their clients also felt axed by the Act. 
Things came to such a pass that some prostitutes brought the matter to 
the attention Viceroy Lord Mayo and his wife through a letter (19 July, 
1869 ) most probably written by someone on their behalf. The chaotic 
situation forced a section of prostitutes to leave the Sonagachi red 
light area of Calcutta for Chandannagar town, then under French rule, 
and throng the brothel that had existed there since the 1770s.

This 200 year old settlement was demolished by some promoters bent on 
using the land as real estate. The prostitutes living there couldn’t 
resist the onslaught; nor did any organization come to their rescue. I 
view the event from the standpoint of ‘rights’ and relate it to the 
recently proposed amendment to the existing ITPA Act ( 1987 ). Which 
tends to treat prostitution as criminal offence even as it has not been 
declared illegal. Without making any provision for their rehabilitation 
or alternative livelihood, this official move I argue, is going to take 
away the little space that the ‘fallen’ women have and marginalize them 
further.

Surojit Sen (surojit369 @yahoo.co.in) does research for documentary 
films, writes book reviews, short prose pieces on literature and scripts 
for telefilms (in Bengali). He renders editorial service and is now 
working on his first Bengali novel named City Edition.


Mohit K. Ray
Heritage Ponds of Kolkata: A Contemporary History

Kolkata is a city of ponds. Job Charnok, the first well-known British 
merchant, set up his office by the side of a pond called Lal Dighi, 
which still exists to remind of this city’s colonial past. There are 
many ponds like this with rich historical linkages. Many streets and 
places of Kolkata are named after ponds. Even after the onslaught of the 
real estate sector, the city has more than 3500 ponds. The significance 
of these urban waterbodies as water resources is being appreciated now 
as never before. These ponds form a part of the cultural history of the 
city. Once, it was the place where community people met during bathing; 
Bengali literature has so many narratives about the ghats of these 
ponds. The fields by the side of some ponds provide space to hold fairs. 
However, there is still no proper documentation of such an important 
city heritage. This study will add to the urban cultural history where 
the city ponds are not mere past heroes, but active agents of a thriving 
present.

Mohit Ray (mrsg @vsnl.com), the principal researcher, is an 
environmental professional who has a PhD in Chemical Engineering and 
works for environmental rights.


12.30 – 1.30
Rethinking the Social
Chair: Vivek Narayanan

Santana Issar and Aditi Saraf
Rethinking Animal Activism in an Urban Context

Human-animal relationships have been historically constituted in complex 
and intimate ways along the economic, the affective, the cultural and 
ritual, and the metaphoric. As these relationships have receded into an 
irretrievable past, it has been suggested that animals have been 
reconfigured in the urban imagination; as household pets, as objects of 
wonder in zoos and circuses, and as (Kentucky or not) fried chicken.

Our question is - does this driving of a wedge between human lives and 
those of animals inform dominant notions of 'animal welfare'?

We study the relationship between the theory of the human-animal 
interaction in a post-industrial urban context, and the practices of 
animal rescue and welfare, in order to understand how, and to what 
extent, each is shaped by the other. All this in the particular context 
of our very own urban jungle – Delhi.

Both Santana Issar (santanaissar @gmail.com) and Aditi Saraf (aditisrf 
@gmail.com) are graduates of St Stephen's College. Santana is a 
filmmaker, Aditi works as a research associate at the National Knowledge 
Commission.

Arnab Chatterjee
Beyond Private and Public: New Perspectives on Personal and Personalist 
Social Work

In the first part of my presentation ( in the final version of the paper 
too) I shall dwell on the importance of the public/private divide in 
modern social theory and ask, is the public/private divide the main 
unresolved dilemma that haunts the sign of our own times ? How does the 
personal interrupt and contaminate the above binary and wherefrom our 
engagement could temporarily begin? An impersonal public sphere, 
threatened by the deceptive nature of the personal, was founded to 
ground political modernity and was extended to cover such remote 
questions of personal charity which –some like Hegel sought to replace 
by state related public assistance or welfare. This normalizing 
restraint was energized even at the level of speech, but through the 
instance of personal attacks, the repressed narrative of the personal 
seemed to recur at the cost of our unease—a political pornography of 
sorts. An excavation informed us--behind the masked ordeal of innocent 
impersonality, there lurks the obscene narratives of manipulation, 
lying, backstabbing, blackmailing, fraud, betrayal, malice by which 
persons govern each other.

Now, all proposed resolutions, located within the impasse, have they 
worked? I discuss the Gandhian attempt and discuss the dictatorial 
desire. The failure to integrate the public and the private until it 
vanishes in the terrorized unity of the person/al -- inaugurates—in a 
sense-- and urges us to recover the suppressed history of the personal 
and subsequently a theory of the personal with its roots in the German 
version of personalism.

Finally, does the category personal, through the sieve of personalist 
social work, solve the public/private problem posed in the beginning, or 
compound the problem further? How, despite the personalist indeterminacy 
and irreducibility of the person, a personalist ethics could be found 
will be addressed in this section; I’ll spend a considerable five 
minutes on the above and end by reflecting on my most recent work not 
covered in SARAI postings.

Arnab Chatterjee (apnawritings @yahoo.co.in) is Doctoral Fellow at the 
department of Philosophy, Jadavpur University, Kolkata and on the 
visiting faculty of Ethics and Human Values at the Bengal Institute of 
Technology, Kolkata.

1.45 pm – 3.45 pm
Special Presentation: The SARAI-CSDS Associate Fellowships
Chair: Monica Narula
[Monica Narula (monica @sarai.net) is a media practitioner with a 
background in filmmaking and English Literature. She is one the 
co-initiators of Sarai and one of the editors of the Sarai Reader 
series. She is part of the Raqs Media Collective. She coordinates the 
media practice projects at Sarai.]

Nancy Adajania: A New Journal for the Arts: Prototype Issue, 2007

Although there have been exciting recent developments in the world of 
Indian art, there is a strong sense that much of it has been happening 
in the dark, without enough open discussion made widely available to the 
public. Hoskote and Adajania argue that in order for art to have 
significance and value beyond a point, it needs to be made in the 
context of lively discussion and critical debate. Modern India has had a 
rich history of such critical initiatives, but in the current context 
there are very few platforms for such engagement; those that do exist 
confine themselves largely to reporting on events, or more often, to 
sales figures and scandals, focusing on the life of the studio, the 
solitary creator, and of economic institutions such as the gallery and 
the auction house. Both senior art critics in their own right, Hoskote 
and Adajania propose to make a journal that focuses on actually 
mobilising and creating a new context for the production of art.

Rather than being a public relations exercise for art in India, the 
journal would be a colloquium across disciplines, regions, traditions 
and intellectual lineages. It would include, among other forms of 
writing, analytical essays, tactical accounts, select reviews, and 
polemical texts. The journal would be interested in developing a 
perspective of what the proposal calls “a nuanced critical regionalism”, 
which would reject both the “neo-tribalism” of an inward-looking 
isolationism, as well as an uncritical globalism that lacks anchorage in 
a specific cultural context. Last but not least, the journal would seek 
and institute collaborative ventures between artists and public-sphere 
or civil-society activists.

Nancy Adajania (nancyadajania71 at yahoo.co.uk) is a well-known cultural 
theorist, art critic and independent curator. She is developing this 
project for the Associate Fellowship with Ranjit Hoskote.


Debkamal Ganguly: An Imaginative Text Based on Contemporary Travel 
Through the “Forests” Described in Bibhuthibhushan’s Memoirs

[note showing of complete video by Debkamal Ganguly at 4.30 on previous 
day, Thursday December 6. On the 7th, Ganguly will show excerpts from 
the video, discuss its making and answer questions.]

Sarai generally focusses on urban spaces and the processes of 
urbanisation. However, a very crucial emerging question in contemporary 
India is, how are “rural” and forest spaces being transformed in the 
current context, and what is the relationship of this process to the 
development of cities? One could look at the question only in terms of 
contemporary transformations, but another approach would also situate it 
historically, in relation to accounts of what these non-urban areas used 
to look like. The project looks precisely at this question, in the 
context of Eastern India. Debkamal Ganguly is interested in how the idea 
of “nature” has developed and has been changed by visitors from the 
city, over several decades, including himself. He seeks to understand 
"how an otherwise 'underdeveloped' marginalized geographical/cultural 
space in the immediate west of the Gangetic plains has been entangled in 
multilayered relationship with the urban consciousness and artistic 
creativity of Kolkata."


4.00 – 5.30 pm
Towards a Future for Independent Research: Interactive Open Discussion

All participants.

7.00 – 8.30 Punches Ponytails Ringtones: Women Boxers in India
A film by Pankaj Rishi Kumar (82 mins)
Introduced by Shuddhabrata Sengupta

“This is a journey into the science of boxing as practiced by 2 Indian 
women. From Dec’04 to May’07, I shot with them as they tried to 
understand their bodies, their undying love for the sport and their 
constant struggle to realize their dreams. The film unfolds their story.”

Pankaj Rishi Kumar (kumartalkies at yahoo.com) has been making making 
documentary films for the last 11 years. His best known films include 
Kumar Talkies. He showed the first rushes from his Independent 
Fellowship project on women boxers at the 2005 workshop.