An Evening of Mindfulness

Led by the Monastics and Teachers of the Thich Nhat Hanh tradition

 

There will also be the launch of two titles by Thich Nhat Hanh, ‘No Mud, No Lotus’ and ‘Work’, published by The Aleph Book Company

 

(Collaboration: Ahimsa Trust and Aleph Book Company)

 

 

BOOK DISCUSSION GROUP

 

Indira Gandhi: A Life in Nature

By Jairam Ramesh (New Delhi: Simon & Schuster India, 2017)

 

Panelists: Dr.Mahesh Rangarajan, Ashoka University; Shri Samar Singh, IAS, former Secretary General, World Wide Fund for Nature-India; and Ms Sunita Narain, Director General, Centre for Science and Environment

 

Chair: Dr. Karan Singh, MP Rajya Sabha

 

 

CREEDS OF OUR TIMES

Curator: Rajiv Mehrotra

 

The Long Search - VII

A film presented by Ronald Eyre

 

Reflections on the Long Search (51 min; dvd; English)

In this episode Ronald Eyre asks himself some questions. It is not a film in which he hands out diplomas to believers of the religion that pleased him best. The search, for him, began long before this series got off the ground and will continue long into the future. There are no winners and no loser. There is an element of personal stocktaking, however, and before doing so, Eyre reveals his own background, the mental furniture that he of necessity packed whenever he goes on search

 

(Collaboration: Foundation for Universal Responsibility of His Holiness the Dalai Lama)

 

 

Martin Luther, the Jews and the City of Frankfurt am Main

Speaker: Mr. Procolino Antacido, Principal, the German School, New Delhi

 

On the 500th anniversary of The Reformation of 1517, the talk re-examines the role of Martin Luther and the second great division of European Christianity after the Schism between East and West half a millennium earlier. The talk also focuses on the city of Frankfurt and the situation of the Jewish communities during the period of transition from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance and how the life of the Jewesses and Jews was changed as a result of the reformation of Martin Luther

 

(Collaboration: Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany; and Federation of Indo-German Societies in India)

 

 

 

Directed by Pankaj Butalia who will introduce the film

Produced by Films Division

 

Screening will be followed by a discussion

 

Vivan Sundaram gave up painting in the 1980s and has since shifted to installation work. Over the past 25 years he has worked ceaselessly – rushing from one project to the other – almost as if he was running out of time. The film looks at this stage of his work and at the centrality of the ‘found’ object to it, as well as his thirst to shape this ‘closer to his heart’s desire’

 

 

Hindustani Music – Flute Duet

By Ravinder Rajput and Ganesh Singh from Delhi, disciples of Shri Kailash Sharma

 

 

Because We did Not Choose (92 min; 2017; dvd; English subtitles)

Directed by Wanphrang Diengdoh who will introduce the film

 

Screening will be followed by a discussion

 

Because we did not choose looks at World War I and the involvement of communities at a time when spaces inhabited by them were transitioning or struggling to accommodate modernity and the rest of its implications. The film is a meticulous documentation of the journey made by the labourers from North East India to the war front. Shot over a period of 4 years, this is the only film from India that examines the participation of indigenous labour in the theatres of the First World War

 

 

Celebrating Isaiah Berlin: 20 years After

Speaker: Dr. Ramin Jahanbegloo is a political philosopher.   Professor and Vice Dean and Executive Director, Mahatma Gandhi Centre for Peace Studies, Jindal Global Law School

 

Chair: Shri Ashok Vajpeyi

 

By the time Isaiah Berlin died in November 1997 at the age of 88, a worldly fame had long since come to surround his name as the great political thinker of the age. He was also celebrated as one of the leading liberal thinkers of the century and as a remarkable historian of ideas. An acute practical analyst of international politics, a biographer of Marx and a translator of Turgenev in English, a longtime participant in Jewish affairs, a director of the Royal Opera House, a President of the British Academy and the founder of Wolfson College at Oxford, Isaiah Berlin was a man for all seasons and a humanist with diverse intellectual interests. It would be difficult to approach Berlin as a systematic thinker and philosopher or to reduce his writings to a systematic statement. Yet, while Berlin’s work ranges across many disciplines and embraces a varied cast of concepts and ideas, there is one principal leitmotif behind all his concerns and convictions. For Berlin the history of ideas was not a way to analyze the belief-systems of the past or portray the progress from one idea to another, but rather an art of understanding men’s relationships to each other and to their institutions

 

 

Gustav Holst – Choral Hymns from the Rig Veda

Vedic Hymns from Sanskrit to English by Gustav Holst

By The Bangalore Men

With Vimal Kurian on the piano

Conductor: Jonas Olsson

 

The all-male voice ensemble The Bangalore Men, consists of fourteen singers who came together in 2016. Each with many years of experience singing in choirs, the group focuses on western classical music from eras ranging from medieval music to contemporary. The singers are: Jonas Olsson, Sudipto Biswas, Philip Thomas, Allwyn Prasanna, Ravikumar T V, Anup Abraham Thomas, Jessel C. Mathews, Venkatesh Vicky, Abhishek K. Mathew, Chinglang Konyak, Nivedh Jayanth, Chetan Anthonthy Noronha, Taruna Bhalla, Alexander M. John, Abishek Gnanaraj and Subin Thomas

 

(Collaboration: Sardana Creative Consultancy; and Delhi Music Society)

 

 

 

Introduction: Shri Prabhat Kumar, Former Cabinet Secretary

Speaker: Shri Vinod Rai, Former Comptroller and Auditor General of India

 

(Collaboration: IC Centre for Governance)