Maestros to grace Krithi literature festival
Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan to inaugurate the 10-day event tomorrow.
KOCHI: Kochi is set for the 10-day literary and knowledge festival scheduled to be inaugurated on Thursday by the Chief Minister. The inaugural day will be followed be a book-exhibition at a specially designed hall in Marine Drive. The seminar and discussion sessions will be held at Bolghaty Palace from March 6. Jnanpith award winner and doyen of Malayalam literature MT Vasudevan Nair is scheduled to inaugurate the literary and knowledge session on March 6 evening. Well known Kannada writer and newly elected president of Kendra Sahitya Academy Chandrasekhara Kambar will introduce the concept behind the festival.
Writer Kiran Nagarkar will deliver the keynote address, while T. Padmanabhan, M.K. Sanu, M Leelavathy, K. Satchidanandan, C. Radhakrishnan, Rajan Gurukkal and Shaji N. Karun will jointly light the ceremonial festival lamp. The next four days will have a series of sessions on issues covering culture, literature, visual arts, history, politics and world literature. The inaugural day of the festival onMarch 7 will begin with the keynote address by Satchidanandan. The address will be followed by a simultaneous sessions on ideas that changed the world, artist and society and Malayalam literature, Indian Literature, Theatre and Cinema, India Since 1990, World Literature, Idea of Equality and Freedom of Knowledge.
The session under ideas that changed the world will see presentation on the Capital in an age of crisis and has a panel comprising CP Chandrsekhar, Prabhat Patnaik and Anil Bhatti. The artist and society session will cover cultural fascism and cultural nationalism. J. Prabhash, Kureepuzha Sreekumar, P.K. Pokker, Siddique M.A. and V.K. Sreeraman are scheduled to speak of cultural fascism while Ken E.N. Kunhamad and Sunil P. Elayidom will be dealing with cultural nationalism.
The session on Malayalam literature will see the presentation of literary criticism by a panel comprising George Onakkoor and many others. Well known scholar Utsa Patnaik is scheduled to speak on Land constraint, primary exports and domestic food security. Another notable session will be of Tamil writer Perumal Murugan. The second day on March 8 will begin with the keynote address by N.S. Madhavan followed by a conversation between noted cultural writer Sadanand Menon and music exponent T.N. Krishna.