3 Tamil Nadu poets for Delhi biennale

Organised by the Raza Foundation set up by the late illustrious artist Sayed Haider Raza, ‘VAK: The Raza Biennale of Indian Poetry’ is spearheaded by senior Hindi poet and former bureaucrat Ashok Vajpeyi, the Executive Trustee of the Foundation. 

“We want to bring to the attention of the people of Delhi, the magic of poetry, not just in Hindi, English and Urdu but also languages like Kashmiri, Assamese, Manipuri, Tamil etc. For this inaugural festival, we are bringing in poets, both well-known and those upcoming ones who have been recommended by stalwart poets,” says Vajpeyi. 

Spread out from April 7 to 9, the festival will see each invited poet getting 15 minutes for reading a selected poem, including translations. 

Popular Tamil poet Salma who chips away at patriarchal systems and misogyny through her writings, is among the five invited poets who will inaugurate the festival. The other poets in the inaugural are Haraprasad Das (Oriya), Nilim Kumar (Assamese), Ratan Thiyam (Maniouri) and Majrooh Rashid (Kashmiri).

Other notable names include K Satchidanandan (Malayalam), Sharmila Ray (English), Kanji Patel (Gujarati), H S Sivaprakash (Kannada) and Mangalesh Dabral (Hindi). 

“We would, through this poetry, feel, see and hear an India which is on the move, which is changing and inventing new imagination, which is accommodative and inclusive, which lives and celebrates plurality. An India which is plural and, by the same taken, timeless and enduring,” says Vajpeyi.  

Besides readings, there would be three panel discussions with writers and intellectuals on ‘Poetry as Freedom’, ‘Poetry as Memory’ and ‘Poetry as Conscience’. Keki Daruwala, Sitanshu Yashaschandra, and Shiv Visvanathan, Udayan Vajpeyi, Ashis Nandy, Ramin Jahanbegloo, Shamim Hanfi, Ananya Vajpeyi, Krishna Kumar, Apoorvanand and K Satchidanandan are among those participating in the seminars. 

A special book edited by senior Hindi poet, Ashok Vajpeyi and art writer, Shruthi Issac containing poems by all the participating poets will be launched. All poetry living academics, students from various universities and colleges have been invited to attend the festival. 

‘VAK’ as the Raza Biennales are to be called is conceived as a three-edition event. The first one in 2017 centered on Indian Poetry, the second in 2019 featuring Asian Poetry and the third in 2021 (the birth centenary year of Raza) would be devoted to World Poetry. 

“The triptych, as it were, would bring forth the rich plurality of voices, visions, resonances, memories, styles, languages, rhythms, innovations, structures and furious innovative verve in sharp focus. Hopefully, the first biennale would affirm the vibrancy and vitality of contemporary poetic imagination as it manifests itself through different generations of poets, 45 in number belonging to 15 languages,” finishes Raza.