The Jaipur Literary Festival 2012, 20 - 22 January 2012

The Jaipur Literary Festival 2012, 20-22 January 2012 A highly excited group of 5 students and 2 teachers boarded an Innova on a fiercely cold Thursday afternoon. We chugged into Jaipur by dinner time. The festival was everything it promised to be and much more. A carnival, a celebration of books and intellectual discourse. The setting was spectacular. The fascinating old Diggi Palace was gaily festooned with flags and buntings. On its sprawling lawns and under colorful shamianas, was played out one of the largest and most prestigious international literary festivals. There were simultaneous happenings at 4 different venues making choices extremely difficult for us. Which one to go to? They all looked interesting. An animated discussion on The Arab Spring compered by Barkha Dutt was succeeded by Indian playwright Girish Karnad engaging British playwright David Hare on the front lawns. Then there was the Tiger Mom, Amy Chua who put up a brave defense for her Chinese parenting designed to raise Successful Kids in America. But it was, we felt, not wholly different from how Indian parents raised their kids a generation ago! Then there was best- selling Indian novelist Chetan Bhagat who was utterly frank and delightfully wicked as he shared his down-to -earth philosophy on corruption and education which made us laugh a lot. Lovely Fatima Bhutto and Ayesha Jalal from Pakistan captivated us with their scintillating dialogue. The editor of the famous magazine, The New Yorker was also there and talked about the writing of his biographies, while West-Indian writer Jamaica Kincaid read out a short story which was really short, being exactly 300 words long! All this and much more made the festival. But the star for most was Oprah Winfrey who charmed the audience with her I have immense admiration and respect for the women of India who were in arranged marriages, which later turned into love marriages. Wearing a yellow and green salwar kameez, Oprah said, There is much more to India than poverty its glorious traditions, culture and history are very impressive. back for this, our Principal and Vice-Principal who came down on Sunday were able to hear Oprah and later the spiritual guru Deepak Chopra. We would like to add here that the crowds had been huge everywhere but, amazingly, there was no hustling or jostling at the venues. Good manners were the order of the day displayed by even the security officials! What a refreshing change. Neither was there any VIP seating. First come, first served was the order. But woe betide you if you wished to go to the loo. There being no reservation, your seat was in danger of being taken! We were delighted to find many familiar faces at the Festival. Several of them have been to our school beginning with the main organizers novelist Nomita Gokhale and film-maker Sanjoy Roy! Sir Mark Tully, journalist, John Elliot have graced our Dr. Amidas Goradia Debate. Pande. We are very happy that our School gave us an opportunity to hear and interact with famous national and international literary figures. For some of us it was like having a dream come true. Though we could not stay As also authors like Urvashi Butalia and Ira Students who attended were Umang, Asis Mansingh, Sonakshi Sharma, Meher Kaur, Arunima Bhutani and Urja Chhabra, Accompanying teachers were, Principal maam, Vice-Principal maam, Ms. Mithu Paul and Ms. Gandharvi Mukherjee.