The State of Higher Education in India

Speaker: Professor John Varghese, Principal, St. Stephen’s College

 

Chair: Ambassador K.P. Fabian

The State of Higher Education in India

 

Speaker: Professor John Varghese, Principal, St. Stephen’s College

 

 

 

Chair: Ambassador K.P. Fabian

 

 

 

Prof. Varghese taught English at St. Stephen’s college in the 1990s. He was Head, Department of Communications at English and Foreign Languages University, Hyderabad, before taking over as Principal.

 

 

 

The state of higher education leaves much to be desired. The distinguished speaker will draw attention to the challenges the nation faces in this regard

 

 

MINI-INPUT: BEST OF PUBLIC TELEVISION

 

Screenings And Discussions

(INPUT is the consortium of International Public Service Broadcasters)

 

The presentation will showcase some of the best public service broadcasting films and programmes from around the world, exploring unconventional and new ways of telling stories. It will emphasise the role of documentaries in public service broadcasting and the ways in which the agendas of broadcasting need to and can be expanded in keeping with the digital revolution. 

 

Iris Yudai and Deniz Sertkol will lead the analyses and discussions around the films and programmes.

 

Iris Yudai is an Executive Producer with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation in Manitoba, responsible for commissioning and overseeing documentaries with independent producers and programming the summer TV series Absolutely Manitoba. She is also a trainer and mentor, regularly leading training sessions for television, radio and digital producers. She has extensive experience in facilitating development sessions for programmers and presenting workshops on writing and storytelling. She has also led the development and production of several radio programmes, on CBC Radio One

 

Deniz Sertkol works for the Film, TV and Radio Department of the Goethe-Institut Headquarters in Munich and is involved with monitoring and coordinating operations across various German public radio and public television companies. She has earlier worked at the Feature Film and TV Film Department at the Franco-German Channel ARTE G.E.I.E. and for several film festivals, including Berlinale Forum, Berlin Critics‘ Week and Filmfest Munich. She has also free-lanced as film critic for several years

 

Inauguration: ABHIJIT DASGUPTA, National Coordinator, INPUT

 

Abhijit Dasgupta has been associated with news since the early 60s and with television from the early 90s. He is an alumnus of the Film and Television Institute of India and also trained at BBC London; AIBD Malaysia; NDR Germany and ABC Australia. He was Station Director, Doordarshan; Bureau Chief, Worldwide Television News; Production-in-Charge, ESPN; and Production Head, NDTV and Aajtak for their election telecasts. His films have received two National and twenty eight international awards. Abhijit is the National coordinator for India and a past Board Member of International Public Television

 

Films

Three Thousand ( ‘Asinnajaq; 14 min; Canada) 

Director: Isabella-Rose Weetaluktuk 

 

‘My father was born in a spring igloo—half snow, half skin. I was born in a hospital, with jaundice and two teeth.’ With quiet command, the young Inuk artist plunges us into a sublime imaginary universe – of luminescent, archive-inspired cinema that recast the past, present and future of Inuit in a radiant new light. Delving into the NFB’s vast archive, she casts a net across the complicated history of Inuit cinematic representation, harvesting fleeting truths and fortuitous accidents from a range of sources.

 

Human Smugglers (59 min; Denmark) 

Directors: Poul-Erik Heilbuth, Georg Larsen

 

For the first-time human smugglers reveal – on camera and unmasked – the secrets of their trade. The Film offers a real picture of the industry that has brought millions of migrants to Europe. It gives us the chance to open doors that have been closed for years and see the whole debate from a quite new angle.

 

(Collaboration: Public Service Broadcasting Trust)

 

To mark the 27th Anniversary of the Presidential assent to the Prasar Bharati Act, 1990

 

Discussion on 'Is Indian media under siege?'

Speakers: Ms Pamela Philipose, Public Editor, The Wire; Shri Om Thanvi, Consulting Editor, Patrika Group; Shri Vinod Sharma, Political Editor, Hindustan Times; Shri L K Sharma, veteran journalist  

 

Moderator: Suhas Borker

 

Is Indian media being manipulated? Is dissent being expunged? Is there an "undeclared emergency”? Has censorship and managing the headlines given way to something more insidious? Are fake news and troll factories and assembly lines of Goebbelsian tweets and violent threats subverting democratic processes?  Is media being polarised against itself?  

 

(Collaboration: Jan Prasar) 

Fire to Fire From Dawn to Dusk: North East India’s Vanishing Way of Life

An exhibition of photographs by Shyamal Datta from Shillong

 

Preview on Tuesday, 11 September 2018 at 18:30

 

In this collection, the metaphoric day starts when the family wakes up at dawn and lights the central fire at the hearth. Food is cooked and eaten after which all members leave the house for the hills to tend to their crops. At sunset, the family returns and light up their hearth once again to eat, drink and be happy together, before the cycle starts again the following day. An exhibition that visually records a fascinating, unique way of life for posterity – a way that is confronting the contradictions of modernity

 

The Best of Dharamshala International Film Festival: 10 to 12 September 2018

 

The Swallow (Switzerland)

(102 min; 2017; dvd; English subtitles)

Director: Mano Khalil

 

In this delicate, tragic drama, Mira, a young, bored Swiss woman, goes in search of her father in Iraqi Kurdistan – a father she has only ever seen in a few photographs but whom she has placed on a pedestal…

 

The Best of Dharamshala International Film Festival: 10 to 12 September 2018

 

Turup (India)

(72 min; 2017; dvd; Hindi with English subtitles)

Direction: Ektara Collective

 

In the neighbourhood, chess is a popular pass time with roadside games bringing together men from different strata. Their pawns include morality and religion, causing social and political tensions to erupt when a tournament gets underway. But against this simmering backdrop, are other forces at play – a domestic worker with a secret hobby, a young woman in love, and a former journalist struggling with married life, each must make their moves with care

 

 

The Best of Dharamshala International Film Festival: 10 to 12 September 2018

One of India’s most alternative, off beat and eclectic film festivals held once a year in McLeodganj in Dharmshala, the Dharamshala International Film Festival (DIFF) was first started in 2012. Conceptualized by filmmakers Ritu Sarin and Tenzing Sonam of White Crane Films as a means of bringing quality contemporary, independent Indian and World Cinema to the culturally diverse location of Dharamshala. From 10 to 12 September 2018, we present a selection of the finest films presented at DIFF 2017

 

Out of this World (USA)

(75 min; 1954; dvd; English)

Director: David Wright

 

Out of this World is an updated version of an expedition film shot in 1949 by Lowell Thomas Sr. and Lowell Thomas Jr., whilst on a three-month trip to Lhasa. It provides a window on life in Tibet just months before the country was invaded by China and features footage of His Holiness the Dalai Lama aged just 15

 

People on the Run, People on the Move: Displacement, Security and Gender in South Asia

Panelists: Prof. Paula Banerjee (Vice Chancellor, Sanskrit University, Kolkata); Prof. Ranabir Samaddar (Director, Mahanirban Calcutta Research Group); and Dr. Sanjoy Hazarika (Director, Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative, New Delhi) (tbc) 

 

Chair: Dr. Meenakshi Gopinath

 

(Collaboration: WISCOMP)

Kabir Sandhya  

Pt. Madhup Mudgal renders 'Kabir Bani' in his own unique style. The rendition includes his recently composed new compositions of Kabir Sahib  

 

Accompanists: Gurbhej Singh and Gurpreet Singh on  tabla; Manish Sharma on harmonium; Ganesh Singh  on manjira;  Sawani Mudgal on vocal support; Vivek Bhola and  Khushal Sharma on tanpura and vocal support