Paws and play
Two dogs enjoy a ride down a slide at the Wagathon in SB Somani Park, Cuffe Parade
Classics, all of them
Shubha Mudgal performs at a previous event organised by Murty Classical Library of India. Pic courtesy/MCLI
Audiences at Girgaon’s Royal Opera House were in for a classic jugalbandi of literature, theatre, and music on Monday. Poet Ranjit Hoskote (below) shared the stage with ace stage actors Denzil Smith and Joy Sengupta at the star-studded evening, courtesy The Murty Classical Library of India (MCLI), which celebrated 10 years of Murty’s Classics.
For a decade now, the library has been reviving and presenting Indian classical texts to modern readers. As an apt ode to the efforts, Hoskote revisited sections from the Ten Indian Classics anthology from the library, while academician Amrita Sadarangani read from the original Naskh script of the Sindhi landmark text, The Risalo of Shah Abdul Latif. As veteran vocalist and composer Shubha Mudgal brought the evening to a musical close, MCLI founder Rohan Murty hinted at another happy ending. “By the end of 2025, the translation series will comprise 50 bilingual volumes drawn from 14 languages spanning 25 centuries, and edited by dozens of scholars around the globe,” he shared with this diarist.
The city laid out, on screen
A still from Adhrushya Niwasi (2020), highlighting housing issues faced by migrants. Pic courtesy/Adhrushya niwasi (nagari, 2020)
Mumbai comes with its own set of struggles. As part of the Govandi Arts Festival, from December 10 to 14, five films from the Nagari Short Film Competition, by Goa-based Charles Correa Foundation (a centre for architecture and urbanism research), will be screened at Natwar Parekh Colony, Govandi, on December 13. Each depicts a different urban issue faced by inhabitants of the city. Curious to know more, this diarist reached out to Mansi Bhalerao (right), programme associate and co-ordinator of Govandi Arts Festival.
“These selected films intend to bring attention to the physical environment and infrastructure in Mumbai. It’s a curation of urban challenges, essentially,” Bhalerao informed us. “Pipe Dream (2022) shows water accessibility issues; Jar Jar Ghar (2020) talks of century-old dilapidated structures in South Mumbai, which are on the verge of collapse, and how their residents refuse to leave, for fear of losing their homes.”
Clean me a river
Volunteers gather waste during the drive. Pic courtesy/Gully Classes Foundation
Volunteers, including a large number of college students, were seen partaking in a clean-up drive of the Mithi River at Mahim on December 7. Abdul Munaf, founder, Gully Classes Foundation, which organised the drive, recalled, “Around 170 to 180 participants collected 150 bags of waste, from plastics to puja items. The river’s condition remains poor.”
Something fishy is going on
Meenakshi Tandel. Pics courtesy/No Footprints Mumbai
The pomfret (also known as Chanderi paplet or Saranga) is on the decline in Mumbai’s markets. Travel platform No Footprints Mumbai showcased this issue in recent Instagram posts documenting one of their visits to the Sassoon Docks, Colaba. This diarist spoke with Harshvardhan Tanwar (above), platform co-founder, who explained, “Compared to five years ago, when you would see a pomfret of 350 grams, today you’ll see a single fish of merely 50 grams.
Meenakshi Tandel, a fisherwoman we met, sold her boats, and now purchases fish from others, selling them at the docks. High demand drives unseasonal, unsustainable fishing, depleting supply. The onus is not just on fishing communities, but on us as consumers to understand the marine ecosystem as well.”
Sonia’s pen against the sword
Sonia Faleiro. Pic courtesy/ROBIN CHRISTIAN
Journalist and author Sonia Faleiro has a brave new title in the works. Scheduled for a December 20 release, The Robe and the Sword (HarperCollins) will reveal how a religion associated with peace is being recast into a weapon, close to home in Sri Lanka, Myanmar, and Thailand. The author, who penned her 2006 debut novel, This Girl, as a student in Edinburgh, now takes on militant monks who transformed a tradition of nonviolence into a tool of terror. “This isn’t just about Buddhism — it reflects a global pattern of faith traditions being pulled from their founding principles,” she shared. Does that ring a bell?
