Union Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas and Minister of Housing and Urban Affairs Hardeep Singh Puri will join as Chief Guest on the concluding day…reports Asian Lite News.
The Kalinga Literary Festival is back with its 8th edition and will witness around 300 prominent personalities from the fields of literature, cinema, media and politics, who will deliberate on the theme ‘India at 75: Commemorating the Republic of Letters’, in Bhubaneswar, from December 10 to 12.
The announcement was made by Rashmi Ranjan Parida, Founder, KLF in the presence of Prof. Sachitananda Mohanty, Advisor KLF and Debasish Samantaray, Co-Director KLF during a press meet.
Veteran Odia writer Shrinavas Udgata, poet Arun Kamal and actress and writer Divya Dutta will be conferred with the Kalinga Literary Awards of 2021. Young writer Taro Sindik will be conferred with the Kalinga Literary Youth Award of 2021.
Odisha’s Tourism Minister, Jyoti Prakash Panigrahi will be the chief guest during the inauguration of the festival. Ram Prasad Subedhi , Rajya Sabha MP Dr. Amar Patnaik, Dr. Sitakanta Mohapatra, Ramakanta Rath, Jayanta Mahapatra, Haldhar Nag will join the inaugural ceremony. Public intellectual and former Governor Prof. Gopalkrisnha Gandhi will give the keynote address.
Union Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas and Minister of Housing and Urban Affairs Hardeep Singh Puri will join as Chief Guest on the concluding day.
Srinivas Udgata will receive the Kalinga Literary Award while the Kalinga International Literary Award (English & Hindi language) will be given to Arun Kamal. Divya Dutta will get the Kalinga Literary Award (women writer) and Kalinga Literary Youth Award will be given to Taro Sindik from Arunachal Pradesh.
For the last eight years, Kalinga Literary Festival has set a national benchmark in literary festivals.
Leading writers, poets, speakers and performers likely to join the festival include Gajendra Singh Sekhawat (Minister,Jal Shakti), Hardeep Singh Puri ( Union Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas, and Housing and Urban Affair), MP Amar Patnaik Jyoti Prakash Panigrahi (Tourism Minister) and Principal Secretary, Tourism Surendra Kumar.
Those from the Embassy of Nepal in India include Amb. Krishna V. Rajan, India’s former Ambassador to Nepal and Chair, India-Nepal Centre, PHDCCI & Editor/Author, The Ambassador’s Club; Amb. Ranjit Rae, India’s Former Ambassador to Nepal & Author, ‘Kathmandu Dilemma: Resetting India-Nepal Ties’, Anukool Bhatnagar, Chief General Manager & Head-Nepal Desk, State Bank of India.
The three-day festival will cover several dimensions of the interconnections between literature, freedom, republican values, cultural diversity and social equity.
The key sessions will be on topics including Atmanirbhar Bharat, Ayodhya, democracy, cultural nationalism, Generation Y, Indian Languages, Puri, Kashmir, Nepal, publishing industry, ancient history, Media, Market, Children, Women, Transgender, Citizen Engagement, Cinema, Hockey, Covid-19. There will be several one to one sessions with celebrities and leading experts like author Amitav Ghosh and actress and Divya Dutta, entrepreneur and management guru Subroto Bagchi, and historian Dr. Vikram Sampath. There will also be a session on the British Council report on the Indian Publishing Industry.
Apart from the above, more than 30 new books and monographs will be released during the three-day festival. The delegates and speakers of KLF will have a unique opportunity to participate in Heritage Walk called Mystic Walk and participate in plantation and Mystic Mic.
KLF Book Awards 2020-21 in various categories were also announced in different categories including Non-fiction Book, Fiction book, Poetry Book, Hindi Book, Book in Translation, Bhasa First Book, Business Book, Strategic Affairs Book, Environmental Book, Biography/Autobiography Book, Children Book, Sports Book, Life Style and Emerging Trend Books & others. The books were selected from books submitted by publishers all across the categories. 49 books were selected for the years 2020 and 2021.
Rashmi Ranjan Parida, the founder-director of KLF said: “Kalinga Literary Festival (KLF) 2021 returns with the promise of hope and optimism. Our return emphasizes resilience. We are delighted to bring back the joy of the literary spirit to the temple city Bhubaneswar. We welcome our delegates and performers and look towards a great festival amid all Covid-19 safety protocols. We are inviting all literature lovers to watch the festival live on our social media handles.”
Amb Krishna V Rajan, Abhay Mishra, Abhay Kumar Dubey, Aditi Maheshwari, Alka Saraogi, Asit Mohanty Ameya Prabhu, Anindita Ghose, Anshul Chautrvedi, Anu Chaudhary, Anuj Lugun, Anushakti Singh, Archana Soreng, Arun Kamal, Arun Maheswari, Arunava Singh, Ashok Kaul, Ashok Maheswari, Ashutosh Bhardwaj, Atul Thakur, Balendu Diwedi, Basant Chaudhary, Bembem Devi, Bhaskar Mishra Bhavina Patel, Bishnu N. Mohapatra, Boria Majumdar, Chandan Pandey, Debashish Samantaray, Debasis Samantray, Dharmendra Sushant, Dilip Tirkey, Divya Dutta, Dr. Krishna Mohan Thakur, Dr. Amar Patnaik, Dr. KM Thakur, Dr. Liaqat Jafri, Dr. Nazir Azad, Dr. Susma Sharma Gurumayum, Gautam Chintamani, Geet Chaturvedi, Gopalkrishna Gandhi, Goutambuddha Das, Gulzar, Guru Prakash Paswan, Khajur Singh Dogri, Hrishikesh Sulabh, Haldhar Nag Jairam Ramesh, Jayanta Mohapatra, Jayanti Rangnathan, Jyoti Nanda, Kaveree Bamzai, Kedar Mishra, Koral Dasgupta, Mr. Gulham Nabi Haleem Mr. Arif Iqbal MalikMalashri Lal, Malini Awasthi, Mamta Kalia, Manoj Kumar Pandey, Meena K Iyer, Mmhonlumo Kikon, Namita Gokhale, Nandini Krishnan, Navajyoti Ray, Neelesh Raghuwanshi, Neha Sinha, P.R Sreejesh, Santosh Singh, Pallavi Rebapragada,Paresh Patnaik, Pankaj Rag, Paul Waters ,Perumal Murugan, Poonam Vasam, Prabodh Rout, Pradeep Srivastva, Prateek Pattanaik,Pratibha Ray, Pravin Kumar, Priya Kapoor, Priya Sahgal, Priyanka Chaturvedi, Prof. Prabhakar Singh, Prof. Ashok Kumar Kaul, Prof. Banibrata Mahanta, Prof. Prabhkar Singh, Puja Changoiwala, Rahul Singh, Rajdeep Saradesai, Rajeev Kumar,Rafeeq Soz, Raj Rahi Dogri, Rama Pandey, Ramakant Rath, Ranjan Mallick, Ranjit Rae, Rajat Sethi,Rasheed Kidwai, Rashmi Dhanwani, Rishabh Kothari, Rohit Supkar, Ruchira Chaudhary, Sabin Iqbal, Sachidananda Mohanty, Sai Swaroopa Iyer, Sandeep Bamzai, Santanu Kumar Acharya, Santosh Singh, Satish Padmanabhan, Sekhar Pathak, Raheem Rehbar, Shafey Kidwai, Shantanu Datta, Shekhar Pathak, Shibani Sibal, Shirish Khare, Shubha Sarma, Sunita Bhadwal, Swami Anterneerav, Shri Ram Sharma, Shubhrastha, Sailaja Rabi Shuchi Kulshreshtha, Sitakant Mahapatra, Subroto Bagchi, Sudha Menon, Subas Pani Sanhati Pani, Susmita Bagchi, Swati Chopra, Shriram Sharma, Siddheshwar Mohapatra Tamal Bandyopadhyay, Tarana Husain Khan, Taro Sindik, Tathagat Satpathy, TM Krishna, Trisha De Niyogi, Utpal Banerjee, Uday Pratap Singh Vaishali Mathur, Vandana Rag, Vibha Rani, Vikarant Pande, Vikram Sampath, Pallavi Rebbapragada, Vineel Krishna, Vyomesh Shukla, Yatindra Mishra, Yatish Kumar, Yugal Joshi and Zorawar Daulet Singh will be part of the festival.
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