Assam Government wants to convert music legend Dr Bhupen Hazarika’s Kolkata residence into an archive, Chief Minister Sarbnanda Sonowal said today.
Director of Assam Bhawan in Kolkata was instructed to pursue the matter in obtaining the ownership of the house from its current owner, an official release said here today.
Hazarika, who died in 2011, lived in a house in Tollygunge area of south Kolkata for decades starting from the middle of 1950s.
At a meeting with the officials of Assam Bhawan in Kolkata, Sonowal also said that steps would be taken to erect a statue of Assam’s literary icon Lakshminath Bezbaruah in the Assam Bhawan premises in the metropolis.
Taking stock of the construction works of Kolkata Assam Bhawan, the Chief Minister said that the house must reflect Assamese culture and tradition through its architecture.
An auditorium inside the Assam Bhawan would be used commercially to generate revenue, he said.
The Chief Minister also directed the Chief Engineer of PWD department to construct a ‘namghar’ (prayer hall) in the Bhawan premises.
Sonowal also directed the officials to start a helpline and website for the benefit of the students and patients from Assam to Kolkata coming for higher studies medical treatment respectively, the release added.
(This article has not been edited by DNA’s editorial team and is auto-generated from an agency feed.)
source: http://www.dnaindia.com / DNA – Daily News & Analysis / Home> News> India / PTI / Thursday – May 04th, 2017
From Vir Sanghvi to Aveek Sarkar, everyone is a fan of Tarun Kumar Shaw’s unique personal book home delivery service.
Photo credit: Rana Chakraborty.
If a book has been printed, and is in circulation in even the remotest part of the world, chances are, Tarun Kumar Shaw will be able to get it for you. Be it a banned title, a rare tome, the latest edition of a prestigious science journal, Tarun-da, as he is popularly known in Kolkata, knows how to sniff out that book you want from under a pile of rubbish or email trail half way around the planet. Once the prize is in his hands, he will roll out his trusted two wheeler to ride to wherever you are – at your desk, at the Golf Club, or at the airport lounge – to personally deliver it to you. Commission on every sale depends on the challenges of the Holy Grail.
For more than three decades now, Tarun Shaw has been running what is possibly the only one of its kind personal book home delivery service in Kolkata. From the secured offices of leading media houses, to the corporate offices, the impenetrable Alipore and Ballygunj bungalows to the hallowed libraries of the academic institutions, Shaw has an all-access pass. Rather, he is the all-access pass and can reach where Amazon cannot – into the proud Bengali’s very cluttered headspace.
Ever since his father, Gopal Lal Shaw, wound up his tenure at Dey and Brothers, a bookstore in what used to be the Book Range in New Market, Shaw has been personally delivering books to every client in the city. He has been a particularly familiar and welcome sight in newspaper offices, carrying cases full of books that cover everything from science, politics, fascism ( a popular obsession, he says), general knowledge and literature.
Editors’ pick
In a quiet room in a quiet house, painted in loud pop colours, Tarun-da recapped his extraordinary life as an itinerant bookseller in the city that has been home to two Nobel Laureates, several Sahitya Akademi and Jnanpith awardees. It began with his father, who realised almost four decades ago that traditional bookstores would disappear, but a book lover will still want to read.
“It was to reach out to the diehard reader, and his old clients, that my father decided to start this door-to-door bookselling service,” said Shaw, 53. Calcutta was still reading voraciously at that time, and business flourished. “Our USP was our ability to procure imported newspapers and journals within days, sometimes hours,” explained Shaw about how the Los Angeles Times, New York Times, the various science and literary journals became a part of their repertoire. The Shaws were also canny businessmen and realised that siting on unsold inventory did not make sense. “We only procure on demand. Where is the space to stock books?”
An avid reader, Shaw also perfected the art of reading his client’s mind. “I have always loved talking to people about books. And once I have spent some time with anyone, I get a sense of what he or she would like to read. Next time we meet, I would suggest 10 books out of which, I guarantee you, the client will like at least one.”
Photo credit: Rana Chakraborty.
As work began to expand, Shaw’s elder brother joined the team, though Shaw-junior remained the most visible face of the book business, traversing the city, carrying a dozen odd books every day. That this was a successful business model became evident when others began to try out something similar. But the Tarun-da had an upper hand, and others fell by the wayside.
“I have known legendary editors such as MJ Akbar and Vir Sanghvi,” he said. “The latter especially was extremely generous and introduced me to some of the biggest business families who are now my clients. I enjoy a certain rapport with everyone and they trust me…” He was interrupted by calls from clients, one of whom wanted him to suggest a book to gift at a sacred thread ceremony, and another who wanted something on Swami Vivekananda.
Shaw’s relationship with the ABP Group, the media house that publishes The Telegraph, is special. There have been times when Aveek Sarkar, editor emeritus of the group, has called him in the dead of night to request for a rare title, or a special thesaurus, and Shaw has delivered. The employees too have developed a bond with him. Shaw sells everything from Sidney Sheldon to Andre Gide. He does not judge. The thrill, for him, has been in the chase. “I love challenges,” he said. “Even when Satanic Verses was banned, I got several copies of the book. It took time, but I did it.”
He prefers to sell only English and Bengali books because, in his words, “no one reads books in any other language here”.
Photo credit: Rana Chakraborty.
For the longest time, the city that has had a very special relationship with the written word had a very special place in its heart for the man who showed up with something or the other of interest. While College Street now lives on textbooks and nostalgia, there are hardly any bookstores of consequence left in the city, and Shaw refused to blame the decline on the internet. “It is us,” he said. “One generation gave up reading. But younger people are moving back to books. Kindle could not wipe it out. But why have we not been able to produce any writer of consequence after say a Sunil Gangopadhyay [one of Bengal’s most respected authors]. Why are Paulo Coelho, Jeffrey Archer failing to produce bestsellers?”
Last chapter
Of all the editors he has sold books to, Shaw had the most engaging conversations with the late editor of the ABP Group’s film magazine and noted filmmaker Rituparno Ghosh. “I remember, every time I walked in, he would literally throw everything away from his desk to make room for the books that I carried with me. I have not met anyone who was so obsessed with reading.” After his untimely death, Ghosh’s collection of 1,500 books were gifted to the Satyajit Ray Film and Television Institute. According to Shaw, most of those books were bought from him.
Shaw misses these associations. “It is not work. I have no problems selling you a book and walking away. It is business after all. But it breaks my heart to see a new book lying in a forgotten corner. I used to enjoy going back to my clients to discuss the book. I looked forward to these invigorating, stimulating conversations. I have had clients who call me home point to a wall and say: Isko Kitabon Se Bhar Dijiye! Not just any kind of books, they want leather-bound, gold-embossed books as a status symbol.” Shaw also blamed Bengali soaps for weaning the once fiercely well-read Bengali homemaker off books. “In the afternoons, after lunch, women would retire with a novella, a literary magazine or even a mythological book. Now it is just crap on TV.”
Even in the institutes, money spent annually on procuring rare titles, world class journals, are not actually realised because “not a page is turned”.
Shaw’s son works in Singapore, but he acknowledges his role in helping him reach out to publishers around the world. “I studied in a Bengali medium school. I am not tech savvy either. But my son started tracking down publishers and established a global network which I am still enjoying. He helped me tremendously to expand our business.” But neither his brother’s children, nor his son are interested in taking over the reins of the business. It is not as if Shaw is keen to see it continue either. “The whole business worked on trust, familiarity. People see my face and I put my personal equity out there every day over the past 30 years. We hired a couple of people to deliver newspapers, magazines, but not the books. That is special. It had to be me delivering them to those who waited for them. And it ends with me.”
We welcome your comments at letters@scroll.in.
source: http://www.scroll.in / Scroll.in / Home> Magazine> Book Lovers / by Chandrima Pal / Thursday – May 03rd, 2017
A quiet revolution is unfolding in Mamata Banerjee’s backyard, courtesy her own MSME department.
The department’s retail body, Biswa Bangla Marketing Corporation, has started reviving a vanishing craft that is delightfully British, tracing the last of the Raj-era silversmiths — Maheswar Dutta — at Kansaripara.
TOI found Bengal’s only surviving “Sheffield craftsman” inside a crumbling edifice, down a backstreet of the CM’s Kalighat residence. These days, Kansaripara Lane — the cradle of Bengal’s traditional silversmithy — is no more than a place with decrepit houses that once belonged to Hindu sub-caste Kangshabaniks or Kansaris (bell metal workers) who settled here in the mid-18th century.
Squeezed between Sambhunath Pandit Street and Russa Road, this place is home to artisans who are still visited by leading jewellers for their outstanding craftsmanship. Dutta (63) is the last heir of a tradition extending back to Charnock’s Calcutta. His forefathers spearheaded a resurgence in heritage silver craft of the 8th century Pala dynasty.
“We were displaced from the nearby Gobindopur village, that constituted Calcutta 250 years ago when Robert Clive cleared the swamps to build Fort William,” said Dutta.
Some of the exquisite pieces Dutta and his apprentices, Alok Patra (38) and Biswanath Bodak (28), have forged will shortly travel to London for a Biswa-Bangla exhibition. The idea is to bring these intricate inlay work in dainty velvety boxes back to shoppers’ lists and eventually apply for the GI tag for the “nakshakari” work.
Only the other day, until Biswa Bangla’s chief consultant Partho P Kar tracked the roots of Bengal’s silversmithy, Dutta was a worried man. Now, they are the busiest stakeholders of the heritage craft revival project.
source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / News> City News> Kolkata News / by Ajanta Chakraborty / TNN / May 01st, 2017
Over a hundred exhibits on display capture the legendary film-maker’s multifaceted personality, as a writer, as an illustrator and as a composer.
The exhibition showcases everything related to Ray’s much-feted oeuvre, including photos from his famed Red Books where he jotted down minute details associated with his films.
An exhibition of over a hundred exhibits celebrating 50 years of Feluda, the iconic sleuth created by auteur Satyajit Ray, was inaugurated in Kolkata on Sunday evening ahead of the legend’s 96th birth anniversary on May 2.
The Oscar-winning film director’s 25th death anniversary was observed on April 23.
The assemblage essentially captures everything related to Ray’s much-feted oeuvre, including photos from his famed “Kheror Khata” (red books or manuscripts) where he jotted down minute details associated with his films.
“Though the theme is Feluda, there is much more to be seen in the exhibition, such as his doodles. Initially we were restricting the exhibits to 90 but it has crossed 100. The items exhibited capture his multifaceted personality, as a writer, as an illustrator and as a composer.
“For Feluda afficionados, there are shooting schedule of films like Sonar Kella, sketches and illustrations of Feluda,” a representative of The Society for the Preservation of Satyajit Ray Archives, said. The show will run till May 4 at ICCR and then move to the Calcutta Club.
Revolving around the 27-year-old athletic Pradosh Chandra Mitter, nicknamed Feluda, the novellas showcase the private eye’s superb analytical and observational skills that ultimately solve the mysteries – be it murders, theft or kidnapping.
Said to have been modelled on Sherlock Holmes, the cigarette-smoking and martial art-trained Feluda is accompanied in his sleuthing pursuits by cousin, Tapesh Ranjan Mitra or Topshe who is the narrator of the stories and may have been loosely based on character of Dr John Watson.
Ray also brings in a character called Jatayu (Lal Mohon Ganguly), a writer of thriller novels who provides a much-loved comic relief, from his sixth novella onward.
Feluda possesses a .32 Colt revolver but rarely uses it. In story after story, his major weapon is “magajastra” (the brain). Since the first Feluda whodunit Feludar Goyendagiri (Feluda’s investigation) debuted in December 1965 in the Sandesh magazine, the series has been translated in four Indian languages besides English, French, Italian, Swedish, German and Japanese. The first Feluda book came out in 1967.
The books have spawned hit films, animations and comics and the character has attained cult status among the old and the young alike.
Follow @htlifeandstyle for more.
source: http://www.hindustantimes.com / Hindustan Times / Home> Lifestyle> Art & Culture / by Indo Asian News Service / Kolkata – May 01st, 2017
