South Asian lit fest

The Foundation of SAARC Writers and Literature (FOSWAL) is organising a South Asian literature festival on October 4, 5, 6, 7, 2018, in Delhi.

This initiative of cultural connectivity among the neighbouring countries was launched in 1987 by Ajeet Caur.

It is almost 30 years of continuous endeavour to join the hearts and minds of the people of eight neighbouring countries through culture and literature.

The current festival is the 55th mega event. Besides different cities in India, the festival of literature has been organised in Dhaka, Kathmandu, Lahore, Islamabad, Colombo, Kandy, Thimphu, Male.

Highlights

This festival will be inaugurated in Multipurpose Hall, Kamladevi Complex, India International Centre at 10 am on October 4, and will continue till 8.00 in the evening. The event will also include a film by Buddhadeb Dasgupta, the eminent filmmaker.

For the next three days, the festival will be brought to our beautiful space in the Academy of Fine Arts and Literature on the 5th, 6th, and 7th.

Ajeet Caur, the brain behind the festival, has been the front-runner in many events in the Capital. Her festivals of literature have been attracting a large number of writers, poets, and intellectuals of outstanding stature representing all parts of South Asia.

The number of delegates from each country have been on the increase year after year. In the current festival, among the South Asian countries, Afghanistan is being represented by 30 delegates; Bangladesh is being represented by 53 delegates, Nepal is being represented by 12 delegates, Sri Lanka by 14 delegates, Bhutan by 4 delegates and Maldives by 2 delegates.

Ajeet Caur

Caur reflects on SAARC nations. "In our South Asian region, besides sharing our clouds and monsoons, our birds and animals, our oceans and rivers, our flora and fauna, we also share long civilisational journeys, horizontally and vertically, on micro and macro levels."

Thimphuals, and folk knowledge systems and folklore, that together constitute our cultural identity."

"When I look back, way back in 1986, the launching of a mad dream of catching that elusive golden sparrow called Peace in a rather turbulent SAARC region, through the meeting of creative and sensitive minds, seemed really mad to everybody in power. Whosoever I went begging for granting visas for writers from the neighbouring countries," adds Caur.