'Agla Varka': Celebrating spirit of Punjab through music, literature, art

New Delhi, Jun 27 (PTI) Curated events featuring music, poetry, literature, performance, film and art will be held across the country as part of a new cultural platform Agla Varka that aims to tell stories of Punjab.

Majha House and The Kuldip Nayar Trust have started Agla Varka to begin meaningful conversations on Panjab that reflect the realities on the ground.

Agla Varka 2024 will kick-off on June 29 in New Delhi with a conversation on "Panjab: A Question of Identity". This will be followed by poetry, release of Kirpal Dhillon's "Identity and Survival: Sikh Militancy in India 1978-1993", and conclude with a performance by storyteller and singer Rene Singh.

Participants for the inaugural edition include author and former ambassador of India to the US Navtej Sarna, musician Rabbi Shergill, filmmaker Bani Singh, and poet-singer Daras.

To support this platform and as a first step, Kunzum Books, New Delhi, will have a shelf devoted to the best writing on Punjab - whether it is history, contemporary issues or literature.

The next programme of Agla Varka 2024 will be in Delhi in November. It will move to Amritsar in December with a two-day festival.

"The tag of being a border state has overshadowed everything else," says Preeti Gill, founder of Majha House and programme director of Agla Varka.  Gill set up Majha House six years ago as a literary and cultural space in Amritsar to bring the best writers, poets, performers, singers to the border city and start conversations on Punjab in the state.  "We felt that it was now time to take many of these critical conversations on Punjab to the rest of India. We decided to start the series in June to mark 40 years since 1984, that cataclysmic watershed year that changed things for the state," she adds.

"At a time when India is rewriting its history to include the aam aadmi, the aam aurat, I feel it is essential to include the aam Panjabi," says Mandira Nayar of The Kuldip Nayar Trust and programme director of Agla Varka.  The Kuldip Nayar Trust was started by Nayar's family to preserve his memory by creating conversations on Punjab centred around culture, history and politics. PTI ZMN RB RB