Curator: Rajiv Mehrotra

Siddhartha (89 min; 1972; English)

Director: Conrad Rooks

The film narrates the story of the young Siddhartha (played by Shashi Kapoor), born in a wealthy family, and his search for a meaningful way of life. This search takes him through periods of harsh asceticism, sensual pleasures, material wealth, then self-revulsion and eventually to the oneness and harmony with himself that he was seeking.

(59 min; 2009; English)

Director: Louise Hooper

Jeremy Paxman tells the tragic story of World War One poet Wilfred Owen. At a time of jingoism and wartime propaganda, one Shropshire lad was compelled to tell the truth. Jeremy Paxman travels to the battlefields of France to discover how the ugliest and most terrible arena imaginable gave birth to some of the most poignant and powerful poetry in the English language. Wilfred Owen is played by Samuel Barnett.

https://vimeo.com/143154407 | Click here to watch

A 4-part series directed by David Wallace for BBC2/PBS with the English historian and broadcaster, Michael Wood. The Spanish conquest of the Americas in the sixteenth century was one of the most important and cataclysmic events in history. Spanish expeditions endured incredible hardships in order to open up the lands of the ‘New World’, and few stories in history can match these for drama and endurance.

In Conquistadors, Michael Wood follows in the footsteps of some of the greatest of the Spanish adventurers travelling from the forests of Amazonia to Lake Titicaca, the deserts of North Mexico, the snowpeaks of the Andes and the heights of Machu Picchu. He experiences the epic journeys of Cortes, Pizarro, Orellana and Cabeza de Vaca, and explores the turbulent and terrifying events surrounding the Spanish conquest of the Aztec and Inca empires.

Conquistadores: The Conquest of the Incas (49 min) | Click here to watch

The amazing story of the overthrow of the Inca empire by Francisco Pizarro and his brothers. Following the route taken by the Spaniards, Wood climbs ancient Inca roads to Cajamarca where the Inca leader tried to ransom himself for a roomful of gold and undertakes an epic jungle trek to the lost city of the Incas.

https://www.documentarymania.com/player.php?title=Conquistadors%3A+The+Conquest+of+the+Incas

(58 min; 2002; English)

Director: Robin Dashwood

On 1 July 1952, a 30-year-old architect called Michael Ventris made a BBC radio broadcast which was to secure his place in archaeological and history books forever. He announced that he'd deciphered Linear B, Europe's earliest known, and previously incomprehensible, writing system. His discovery was to revolutionise our understanding of Western civilisation. It was made all the more remarkable by the fact that Ventris was no more than an amateur enthusiast, a man passionately and often tortuously determined to crack the linguistic code which had puzzled experts, archaeologists and academics for three decades.

By Tabasmi Paul Majumdar from Kolkata, disciple of Dr. Malabika Mitra and Pt. Rajendra Kumar Gangani

Video recording of a dance recital for IIC online programme activities

Personal Data under the Constitution

Speakers: K.V. Viswanathan, Senior Advocate, Supreme Court of India and former Additional Solicitor General; and Mariyam Kamil, DPhil Candidate, University of Oxford, General Editor, Oxford University Commonwealth Law Journal (2019-20)

Moderator: Lalit Panda, Senior Resident Fellow (Charkha), Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy

Following the Supreme Court’s 2017 decision affirming a fundamental right to privacy under the Constitution and its 2018 decision on the Aadhaar Act, the governance and governmental use of information technology in India has seen a range of developments at a rapid pace. Much of the conversation on these developments has gravitated towards “informational privacy” or the right of an individual to exercise control over information related to them. This interest in informational privacy has been a paramount concern in a variety of issues related to the use of DNA technology, facial recognition systems, the Pegasus spyware, the legal duties of internet platforms, and national security surveillance. In the midst of this flurry of events, the wait for a comprehensive data protection law continues, and it is critical that we have greater clarity on precisely what protection our Constitution provides for our personal data

(Collaboration: Charkha, the Constitutional Law Research Centre, Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy)

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The Front Page (USA)
(100 min; 1931; b/w; English)
Director: Lewis Milestones

With Adolphe Menjou, Pat O'Brien, Mary Brian

Recipient of NBR Award for Top Ten Films, National Board of Film Review, USA 1931; and National Film Registry, National Film Preservation Board, USA 2010. This American screwball comedy is still widely regarded as one of Hollywood's most accomplished farces. 

The film centres on star newspaper reporter Hildy Johnson who is quitting his job in Chicago to move to New York City with his fiancée Peggy, despite the insistent protests of his editor, Walter Burns. When Hildy shows up at the city courthouse after his last day of work, however, he becomes caught up in the hubbub surrounding the escape of a convicted murderer who is scheduled for execution that night.

https://archive.org/details/the-front-page-1931
Or
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SS2Kezl0EZ4

A three part BBC series

In this series, mathematician Dr Hannah Fry explores the mystery of maths. It underpins so much of our modern world that it is hard to imagine life without its technological advances, but where exactly does maths come from? Is it invented like a language or is it something discovered and part of the fabric of the universe? It's a question that some of the most eminent mathematical minds have been wrestling with. Dr Eleanor Knox from King's College London believes it is discovered, Prof Hiranya Peiris from University College London believes it is invented, while Prof Jim Gates from Brown University believes it is both, and Prof Brian Greene from Columbia University has no idea. The jury is very much divided.

Episode III

Weirder and Weirder (59 min) | Click here to watch

Hannah explores a paradox at the heart of modern maths, discovered by Bertrand Russell, which undermines the very foundations of logic that all of maths is built on. These flaws suggest that maths isn't a true part of the universe but might just be a human language - fallible and imprecise. However, Hannah argues that Einstein's theoretical equations, such as E=mc2 and his theory of general relativity, are so good at predicting the universe that they must be reflecting some basic structure in it. This idea is supported by Kurt Godel, who proved that there are parts of maths that we have to take on faith.

Hannah then explores what maths can reveal about the fundamental building blocks of the universe - the subatomic, quantum world. The maths tells us that particles can exist in two states at once, and yet quantum physics is at the core of photosynthesis and therefore fundamental to most of life on earth - more evidence of discovering mathematical rules in nature. But if we accept that maths is part of the structure of the universe, there are two main problems: firstly, the two main theories that predict and describe the universe - quantum physics and general relativity - are actually incompatible; and secondly, most of the maths behind them suggests the likelihood of something even stranger - multiple universes.

We may just have to accept that the world really is weirder than we thought, and Hannah concludes that while we have invented the language of maths, the structure behind it all is something we discover.