Festival of places: unraveling a unique bond

The capital hosted a three day extravagant event titled "Festival of Places", which commenced from April 7 and concluded on April 9 at IGNCA, New Delhi.

The festival was the brainchild of team CATTS - a not-for-profit organization working in the area of heritage conservation and management, has been envisaged as a convergence of people from all walks of life and disciplines who seek a deeper understanding of our culture through the places we live in as well as share an eagerness to rejuvenate them.

The festival kick started on an enthusiastic keynote by Mr Ashok Vajpayi in Delhi as a one stop for all travelling the globe, which was followed by interesting talk sessions of Nalin Mehta & Amit Mehra, Hanif Kureshi, Kalpana Vishwanath and other intellectual personalities who emphasised on the heritage places and their significance for today's generation. Day 1 concluded with a breathtaking performance of Dastangoi Sunil Mehra & Askari Naqvi.

The Festival unraveled the bond between three unique cities of the nation Delhi, Kolkata, and Lucknow with the similarities they share in terms of its people, places and memories. The festival offered a platter of stimulating talks, interesting stories, engaging discussions, short films, city sounds, unique storytelling, authentic food, crafts, creative workshops for kids and mesmerizing performances by renowned artists which left its audience spell bound and completely drenched in the spirit of Delhi, Kolkata and Lucknow.

Day two marked the yester year's capital Kolkata as the focused city with Amit Chaudhari as the keynote speaker with continuous talk sessions of personalities like Ina Puri, V. Ramaswamy, Paramita Saha along with many others. With these sessions, visitors also got to taste lip-smacking cuisine of Kolkata and performance by Folks of Bengal - Debalina Bhowmick, Sumanta Das Baul and Arijit Chakraborty.

The festival concluded by unwrapping the rich legacy of the City of Nawabs - Lucknow. The keynote speaker Saeed Naqvi not only gave a brief of city's heritage but also bought up sessions for a better understanding of various places in the city from the eyes of professionals coming from different discipline.

"THE LOST SONGS OF AWADH - Re-living The Courtesan" served as concluding event of 3rd day of "Festival of places".

The concert was a programme featuring Manjari Chaturvedi performing the Darbari style of kathak as the representation of the dance of the Courtesan. A dance style known for its delicate movements and expressions, and characterized by exquisite costumes, it originated in royal courtrooms of a bygone era.