Speakers: Amb. Ajay Bisaria, former Indian High Commissioner to Pakistan; Dr. Shalini Chawla, Distinguished Fellow, Centre for Air Power Studies, New Delhi; and Dr. Happymon Jacob, Professor, School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University

Chair: Amb. T.C.A. Raghavan, former Director General, Indian Council of World Affairs and former Indian High Commissioner to Pakistan

The discussion will assess Islamabad’s attempts to navigate the deepening conflict between Beijing and Washington. For many decades, Pakistan’s foreign policy benefitted from simultaneous good relations with both China and the US. As the Sino-US rivalry reshapes the regional landscape in Asia, Pakistan is finding ways to adapt. The discussion will examine the extent of Pakistan’s room for manoeuvre and the domestic consensus in favour of a diplomatic reset with two of its most important strategic partners

(Collaboration: Asia Society Policy Institute)

Ideology and Organization in Indian Politics: Polarisation and the Growing Crisis of the Congress Party (2009-19) 
By Zoya Hasan (OUP Oxford: 2022)
 
Discussants: Shri Mani Shankar Aiyar, politician, former career diplomat and author; Dr. Harish Khare, former Media Advisor to the Prime Minister of India and former Editor-in-Chief, Tribune; Dr. Rahul Verma, Fellow, Centre for Policy Research and Assistant Professor, Ashoka University; and Dr. Zoya Hasan, Professor Emerita, Jawaharlal Nehru University and author of the book
 
Moderator: Shri Bharat Bhushan, senior journalist
 

Frontiers of History

Cartoon Trouble: A History of Times We Did not Laugh

Illustrated lecture by Prof. Ritu Gairola Khanduri, Associate Professor of Cultural Anthropology, University of Texas at Arlington, USA and author of Caricaturing Culture in India: Cartoons and History in the Modern World (Cambridge University Press, 2014)

Chair: Ms Sujata Prasad, Advisor, National Gallery of Modern Art

Globally cartoons continue to spark debates, complaints, petitions, arrests, censorship and violence. This puts the spotlight on a peripheral visual form that has historically flourished as journalism and as art. "Cartoon Trouble: A history of times we did not laugh" approaches cartoons as John Lewis famously said of social justice activism, "good trouble" and "necessary trouble." Cartoon trouble draws attention to the cartoon's generative form and its social life. Beginning with cartoon talk in colonial India, this lecture highlights cartoons that made its intended and unintended audiences squirm and furious. This is an invitation to ponder why cartoons matter and why we must make space for this unsparing art form.

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India’s Economy from Nehru to Modi: A Brief History

By Pulapre Balakrishnan (Permanent Black: 2022)

Discussants: Shri Nitin Desai, Chairman, TERI and former Under Secretary General for Economic and Social Affairs, UN; Shri T.K. Arun, senior journalist and former Editor, The Economic Times; Prof. Amita Batra, Professor of Economics, Centre for South Asian Studies, School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University; and Dr. Pulapre Balakrishnan, Professor of Economics, Ashoka University and author of the book

Chair: Prof. Sudipto Mundle, Senior Advisor, NCAER and former Professor Emeritus, NIPFP

Speaker: Amb. Ranjan Mathai, former Foreign Secretary and High Commissioner to U.K.

Chair: Amb. K.P. Fabian, Professor, Symbiosis University

The United Kingdom has seen the fall of two Prime Ministers, Boris Johnson and Lizz Truss, in quick successions. Rishi Sunak, who lost to Truss earlier has now succeeded her. The economy is in trouble, especially after Brexit. The cost-of-living crisis remains to be attended to. The Conservative Part is deeply divided, and the Labor has increased its lead in opinion polls

Why is Calories Theory Unscientific and How Vedic Nutrition has the Solutions to Modern Day Health Problems

Speaker: Dr. Shikha Nehru Sharma, Founder - ONE Health

Chair: Dr Anu Jindal, Artist, Scholar, Arts Administrator

The calorie theory has played a great disservice to human nutrition and health. Dr Shikha Nehru Sharma, as a medical doctor will speak about the flaws in the Calorie Concept and its consequent adverse effect on people. She will elaborate on her search and discovery of solutions in ancient Vedic concepts of nutrition, thus helping people to actualize their highest potential of wellbeing

Dr. Shikha Nehru Sharma, MBBS from Maulana Azad Medical College Delhi is the founder of Nutriwel Health (India) delivering preventive healthcare advisory programs with Ayurvedic Doctors and Nutritionists integrating Modern Nutrition with Vedic Nutrition

(Collaboration: Urmila Foundation)

Speakers: Dr. Augusto Lopez, Executive Director and Chair, Global Governance Forum, Geneva; and Dr. Arthur Lyon Dahl, President, Global Environment Forum, Geneva

Panel discussion on Perspectives from the fields of Education, Law, Business, the Arts

Panelists: Dr. Kavita Sharma, former President, South Asian University, and former Director, IIC; Shri Pradeep Multani, Past President, PHDCCI; Ms Shovana Narayan, well-known Kathak artist; and Dr. Maja Daruwala, Senior Advisory, Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative

Chair: Dr. Kazem Samandari
 
Gender discrimination is often seen from a human rights perspective; it is a violation of women’s basic human rights, as embedded in the Universal Declaration, the UN Charter and other such founding documents. Moreover, there is overwhelming evidence that restrictions and various forms of discrimination against women are also bad economics. They undermine the talent pool available to the private sector, they distort power relationships within the family and lead to inefficiencies in the use of resources. They contribute to create an environment in which women, de facto, are second class citizens, with fewer options than men, lower quality jobs, lower pay, often the victims of various forms of violence, literally from the cradle to the grave. They are also not fully politically empowered and have scant presence in the corridors of power, whether as finance ministers, central bank governors, prime ministers or on the boards of leading corporations. Why is gender inequality so pervasive? Where does it come from? Does it have cultural and religious roots? And what are the sorts of policies and values that will deliver a world in which being born a boy or a girl is no longer a measure of the likelihood of developing one’s human potential? A look at some of these and other such difficult questions.

Early Mahayana Caves in Western Deccan                                                                                                                                      

Speaker:  Prof Y.S. Alone, Professor in Visual Studies, School of Arts and Aesthetics, Jawaharlal Nehru University who has written extensively on Buddhist caves, on popular neo-Buddhist visual culture, a critic of modern Indian art, and an interpretative framework of Dr. Ambedkar and social sciences. His book 'Early Buddhist Caves of Western India' was published in 2016 and reprinted in 2019. 

Chair: Prof. Seema Bawa, Professor, Faculty of Social Sciences, Dept. of History, University of Delhi

Often the Mahayana phase in the western Deccan is dated to the fifth century CE, this assumption has dominated our understanding for a long time. The lecture contests this assumption and traces the early Mahayana phase in the western Deccan through inscriptional and visual evidence observed in important cave sites such as Ajanta, Kanheri, Kondivite, Panhale-Kaji and Mahad. 
 
 

Panelists: Prof. Manoj Kumar Jha, MP, Rajya Sabha; Shri Jawhar Sircar, MP, Rajya Sabha; and Ms Liz Matthew, Deputy Political Editor, The Indian Express

Moderator: Shri Suhas Borker, Convener, Working Group on Alternative Strategies

This is the 17th edition of the annual discussion started in 2006

(Collaboration: Working Group on Alternative Strategies)

The Lost Buddhist Stupa of Kahu-Jo-Daro: An Attempt at Reconstruction

Illustrated lecture by Shri Sabyasachi Mukherjee, Director General, Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya (CSMVS), Mumbai

Introduction: Dr. Himanshu Prabha Ray
Chair: Shri K.N. Shrivastava, Director, IIC

The Buddhist Stupa at Kahu-jo-daro was a chance discovery. It was part of a large Buddhist establishment in the present-day town of Mirpur Khas in the province of Sindh, Pakistan, and was excavated by British archaeologist Sir Henry Cousens in 1909. This research explores the early history of Singh and the roots of Buddhism in the Gandhara region as well as its influences on Singh and other neighbouring regions. The lecture will reveal the amazing story of its discovery, the possible date, the many instances of its destruction, systematic excavation and finally, an attempt at reconstruction