Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan Inaugurated Three Day Kalinga Literary Festival in Bhubaneswar

Haraprasad Das, Anand Neelkantan and Paramita Satpathy win Kalinga Literary Awards

1. Union Minister Shri Dharmendra Pradhan, Padma Vibhusan Dr. Sitakant Mahapatra, renowned poet Shri Ramakanta Rath, inaugurated the 4th Edition of KLF
2. Shri Haraprasad Das received prestigious Kalinga Literary Award, Shri Anand Neelakantan received Kalinga International Literary Award and Shrimati Paramita Satpathy received Kalinga Karubaki Award
3. Kalinga Art Festival and Mystic Kalinga introduced.

Bhubaneswar: Fourth Kalinga Literary Festival (KLF) focusing on Literature for Peace and Harmony kick started here today. The festival was inaugurated by the Union Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas Shri Dharmendra Pradhan, eminent poet and Padma Vibhusan Dr. Sitakant Mahapatra and renowned poet Shri Ramakanta Rath.

This year the KLF introduced two new awards apart from the already famous award of Kalinga Literary Award. Legendary poet and essayist Shri Haraprasad Das was conferred upon the covetous Kalinga Literary Award for his life time work and contribution to literature. Shri Anand Neelakantan received Kalinga International Literary Award for his contribution popular literature. Shrimati Paramita Satpathy received Kalinga Karubaki Award for her contribution to Odia poetry.

Founder of KLF Shri Rashmi Ranjan Parida delivered the welcome speech, Convener Shri Sangram Dhar spoke about the value of KLF in branding Odisha. Director of KLF Prof Kamala Kanta Dash presented the history of KLF and introduced the theme to the participants. KLF souvenir was launched and two other books Rath Yatra of Dr. Subas Pani and Odisha Parba by Odisha Samaj were also launched in the inaugural session.

The central theme session saw great discussion on the theme of Literature for Peace and Harmony. Speakers Bhalchandra Nemade, H.S. Shivprakash and Kedarnath Singh argued on the role of literature. Haraprasad Das moderated the session. The session also saw the release of Dr. Gourahari Das’s ‘Jhooth Ka Ped’.

To highlight lived experience there were two sessions. The session one was an experience sharing of Padma Vibhushan Sitakant Mahapatra who narrated his time in Harvard. The second lived experience session had Sabyasachi Mohapatra and Sudarsan Pattnaik sharing their life experiences with Diksha Tiwari.

Conversation with Anand Neelakantan by Sujit Mohapatra was a great entreating session. Mr. Anand shared his journey as an author. His narrated his association with television and film industry. Participants were keen to know more about how the brand Bahubali and how is it shaping films.

The session on conversation with Subas Pani was an imagery treat for the lovers of Ratha Yatra. Dr. Pani shared his experience as a keen watcher of Ratha Yatra for last three decades. On the idea of women of today, Pratibha Ray and Maitreyi Pushpa interrogated the contemporary writings on women. Sudipti moderated the session. In the session on Odia literature, Sitakant Mahapatra, Sumanyu Satapathy, Gourhari Das, Debasish Pangirahi, Mrinal Chatterjee discussed on the classical status of the language and the current challenges. Debaprasad Dash moderated the session.

In the book releasing session more than 10 books were released. Mystic Kalinga, the dedicated session for poets was inaugurated by legendary names in Indian literature like Sitakant Mahapatra, Kedarnath Singh, Haraprasad Das and Pratibha Satapathy. The session saw several eminent poets reciting poems. The Mystic Kalinga will be a compilation of poetry to be published each year.

Comments are closed.