Culture & Heritage
9 min read
157

Tribute | Zakir Hussain (1951-2024): An International Music Phenomenon Who Remained Rooted in the Classical

December 26, 2024
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As tributes overflow for tabla maestro and composer Ustad Zakir Hussain, who passed away at 73, on December 15, contrarily, words seem to leave me. The only thing that occupies my mind is that an effervescent life was snatched away prematurely. How does one pay homage to this remarkable man,

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Culture & Heritage
5 min read
166

TRIBUTE | M.T. Vasudevan Nair (1933-2024): Noted Malayalam Writer and Director Dies at 91

December 25, 2024
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Noted writer and Jnanpith Award winner M.T. Vasudevan Nair, who had been undergoing treatment at a private hospital in Kozhikode, Kerala, following heart failure, has died, hospital sources said on December 25. He was 91. “M.T. has died,” a hospital source told PTI without elaborating. He had been under the

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Culture & Heritage
13 min read
150

TRIBUTE | Shyam Benegal was a Diverse and Inclusive Filmmaker

December 25, 2024
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Shyam Benegal’s love for films started when he was a child. His appetite for them was voracious. When he couldn’t afford to watch them, he befriended the projectionist of his local cinema and watched them through his window. Sometimes he and his friend wedged the door open a crack so

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Culture & Heritage
2 min read
147

Frontline At 40 | ‘Tamil-Brahmi inscriptions are the only record of old Tamil’: Interview with Iravatham Mahadevan

December 25, 2024
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Iravatham Mahadevan, an epigraphist of international repute. | Photo Credit: T.A. HAFEEZ Iravatham Mahadevan was an administrator-turned-scholar who did acclaimed work on the Tamil-Brahmi and Indus scripts. His Early Tamil Epigraphy, published in 2003, was based on 40 years of labour on Tamil-Brahmi inscriptions. His earlier work Corpus of Tamil-Brahmi

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Culture & Heritage
10 min read
151

The State of Indian Art: How Cultural Freedom Survives Despite Government Control

December 25, 2024
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Some time ago (in September 2024), government-friendly news portals exerted a lot of energy “fact-checking” and, in the process, denied a viral social media post that claimed that the gigantic “Statue of Unity” sculpture of Vallabhbhai Patel had developed “cracks” and was in danger of collapsing. It was also reported

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Culture & Heritage
11 min read
139

The Show Must Go On: How Cinema Refuses to Fade to Black in India

December 25, 2024
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Indian cinema began contemplating its own mortality exactly four decades ago, prompted into self-reflection by the seismic effects of the television and video revolution across the country. In 1984, just two years had passed since the Asian Games were held in Delhi, an event that was responsible for the mass-scale

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Culture & Heritage
1 min read
145

Best of 2024: Frontline’s Top 12 Stories on Books and Culture

December 24, 2024
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Cultural performances at the INS Khukri Memorial Amphitheatre in Diu on November 14, 2024. | Photo Credit: President of India-X/ANI In his essay in Frontline’s 40th anniversary special, the artist and curator Shuddhabrata Dasgupta writes: “In any society, the health of culture depends on the willingness of practitioners to set

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Culture & Heritage
7 min read
133

Shyam Benegal, The Last Great Auteur of India’s Parallel Cinema Movement, Exits the Stage

December 23, 2024
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Shyam Benegal, who heralded a new era in Hindi cinema with the ‘parallel movement’ in the 1970s and 1980s with classics such as Ankur, Mandi and Manthan, died on Monday, December 23, after battling chronic kidney disease. He was 90. The filmmaker, a star in the pantheon of Indian cinema’s

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Culture & Heritage
13 min read
180

Zakir Hussain: Legacy of a Global Music Revolutionary

December 18, 2024
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A musical titan bowed out too early. For six decades he mesmerised the world with his rhythms and melodies, defying close-minded orthodoxy of traditions, breaking musical barriers, creating new genres, and trying to heal a fractured world the way only a supreme musician can. And what is particularly tragic is

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Culture & Heritage
2 min read
87

Quiet Dies a Craft: Traditional Bengal Boat Making Documentary 2024

December 17, 2024
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WATCH | Quiet Dies a Craft: Traditional Bengal Boat Making Documentary 2024 | Video Credit: Reporting and narration: Suhrid Sankar Chattopadhyay; Videography: Jayanta Shaw; Editing: Samson Ronald K., Kavya Pradeep M; Team Frontline: Abhinav Chakraborty, Saatvika Radhakrishna, and Mridula V.; Produced By: Jinoy Jose P. In West Bengal’s Shyampur, 74-year-old master

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