· “My father was a hypocrite” said Rakesh Anand Bakshi from the stage of Delhi Poetry Festival season 6; in conversation with Brahmanand Singh about his life and father, the famous lyricist Anand Bakshi.
· Eleven distinct sessions were held, in addition to children workshop for poetry by Sumit Sehgal.
· Vineet Panchhi, and Dr. Arshiya Sethi held some highly intriguing and riveting sessions in conversation with renowned poets, writers and authors.
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· Audience was swayed by Danish Iqbal and Mannu Kohli’a mellifluous voice and art of Ghazal singing. Mannu Kohli sung ‘hum dekhenge’ by Faiz ahmad Faiz and Professor Danish Iqbal recounted Faiz’s life story.
· Surjit Patar spoke at length about punjabi literature and poetry in conversation with Dr. Vanita.
· Nidheesh Tyagi, Amy Singh of ‘Daak to Lahore’ fame, and Sudeep sen read poems and verses, and struck captivating conversations talking in length about war, separation, and love.
· As the sun began to set over the Delhi skyline, festival goers gathered to hear indie artist Harpreet.
Captivating conversations, alluring poetry, music, rhymes, and verses of war, peace, love, and romanticism were the key theme of the Day One of on-going two day Delhi Poetry Festival Season -6, held at Indian Habitat centre, New Delhi on 10 December,2022.
An extremely joyful session by Brahmanand Singh and Rakesh Anand Bakshi took audience to the beautiful world of love, romance and music of Anand bakshi and his personality as a father where he reminisce a conversation with his father calling him a hypocrite. He further connoted that his father wrote numerous popular Hindi songs about love but couldn’t express that love in his personal life, was the irony his life contained.
The day began with lamp lighting ceremony by Dolly Singh and DPF board members Dr. Arshiya Sethi, Dolly Singh, Sanjay Arora, Keki Daruwala, Sukrita Paul Kumar, Danish Iqbal, Surjit Patar around 11.30 am.
Away from the hustle of daily life, the festival took place in a serene, peaceful, and thought-provoking environment. It was a scenic beauty to witness poetry, Ghazalein, Nazmein amid breezy open amphitheater of the national habitat center.
Vineet panchhi with his chic demeanor began speaking with his charming voice with guitar playing in the background making it an experience of a video being watched on television. Such well-knit was that session where he recited his poem about characteristics of a poem in Hindi.
After which Dolly Singh quoted “this time we had to scale up the celebration with relevant course of discussion around poetry after Covid-19 put a brief disruption.
In the row of sessions, Professor Danish Iqbal and Mannu Kohli discussed poetry and work of Faiz Ahmad Faiz and sang” kab Yaad Mein Tera Saath Nahi”
Danish endorsed Faiz was a modern voice who wrote iconic nazm “mujhse pehli si mohabbat mere mehboob na maang”. Faiz advocated two forms of love, one with a person and another with your country.
How Faiz lit the dark walls of the prison cell, by writing, composing, and reciting poetry. During his four years of prison, he could write two-volume of poetry Dast-e-Saba and Zindnan Nama. His first prison collection Dast-e-Saba was published when he was inside prison bars. The session tried to understand life from Faiz Saab’s vision of life and took sights from his life.
The audience was swayed by Faiz Saab’s poetry sung mellifluously and brief, short snippets from his life were mentioned. The session was ended by singing “hum dekhenge lazim hai ki hum bhi dekhenge”
Amy Singh, a young poet and a podcaster who runs cross border peace initiative of exchanging letters ‘Daak to Lahore’ also recited beautiful poems and mentioned amrita pritam in her course of discussion. She stressed on importance of authentic communication in resolving problems in our life. Amy Singh was felicitated by Sanjay Arora, Executive Producer DPF, with a momento.
Nidheesh Tyagi recited poems on war wrecked Ukraine. Nidheesh is an editor, poet and media consultant and is currently working on translation of poem of war ravaged Ukraine in hindi. The session was named Ukraine ki kavya pukar- yudh ki vyatha, narrating and sketching agony of war, that war brings sorrow and deepest suffering in soft yet strong flow of words.
He expressed strikingly painful experience of people in Ukraine by renowned posts in their Hindi translation. Lesyk Panasiuk, Iya Liva, Serhiy Zhadan and Marjana Savka to kateryna Kalytko, to name a few of Ukranian poets whom work was recited at the event.
It was followed by “Kuch to log kahenge” conducted by Brahmanand Singh and Rakesh Anand Bakshi in a captivating conversation talking in length about life Anand Bakshi and his work.
Rakesh Bakshi talked about how songs were dialogues earlier, you are bound by characterization and vision of a director and you have to take on pressure to deliver a hit. Pressure of going through couple of flops removes you from the industry regardless of the hits you deliver.
Sumer Singh Sidhu spoke about Heer Raanjha and Waris Shah together from the stage of Delhi poetry festival season 6, celebrating 300 years of Waris Shah.
Festival also expressed variety at its peak with Sunit Tondon’s English poetry recitation. “You words my voice” was a distinct session where Mohammad Ali Shah recited Faiz, Nideesh Tyagi recited Shrikant Verma and Sunit Tandon recited poems by Dom Moraes. Sunit Tandon is the Director of the India Habitat Centre and President of the Delhi Music Society.
Dr. Arshiya Sethi in conversation with writer and author Sudeep Sen discussed the potential of poems and recounted his life journey of becoming a writer.
The day was concluded by Harpreet’s performance. He performed music deeply rooted in folk and classical tradition. He sang, “Main ghaas hu main tumhare har kiye dhare par ug aaunga” by Avtar Singh sandhu aka paash, “main geet bechta hu by bhawani prasad mishr”.
Dolly Arora, founder of the Delhi Poetry Festival expressed her joy and said we have received a wonderful response from the people. We strove to create a fearless and free poetry space as we believe in free expression, inclusiveness, and democracy.
Delhi Poetry Festival, the premier, standalone, multilingual festival launched in January 2013, celebrates the poetic and cultural legacy of the historical city of Delhi. It also conveys the spirit of Delhi – vibrant, vivacious and inclusive. Delhi Poetry Festival brings to you Delhi and Poetry in a capsule.
