5 - 7 December 2019 , Thu - Sat.
GALF 2019 : Speakers | Programme | Partners | Performances | Artwork | Videos
Photo Gallery: Inaugural Day | Day 1 | Day 2
Abdullah Khan
Abdullah Khan is a Mumbai based novelist, screenwriter, literary critic and banker. Born in a village near Motihari, Bihar, Abdullah was initially educated in madarsa (Islamic seminary) and Urdu medium school. In the mid-1990s, he discovered that George Orwell was born in Motihari. And, this Orwell’s connection with his home district drew him towards literature. Abdullah’s writings have appeared in Brooklyn Rail (New York), Wasafiri (London), The Hindu (India), The Daily Star (Bangladesh) and Friday Times (Pakistan) among others. His debut film as a screenwriter, Viraam, was released in the theatres in 2017. Patna Blues is his first novel which is being translated into many languages including Hindi, Urdu, Kannada, Marathi, Malayalam, Bangla and Tamil.
Anand Teltumbde
Anand Teltumbde is a writer, columnist, political analyst, and civil rights activist associated with many civil society organizations. He is published regularly by all popular newspapers and progressive periodicals including EPW in which he wrote a column “Margin Speak”. His recent books are Republic of Caste (Navayana, 2018) and The Radical in Ambedkar (Penguin, 2018), Mahad: The Making of the First Dalit Revolt (Aakar, Delhi 2017) and Dalits: Past, Present and Future (Routledge, 2017). An alumnus of IIM, Ahmadabad, he has held top management position in the corporate world. As an academic, he taught in IIT, Kharagpur, and currently heads Big Data Analytics Programme at Goa Institute of Management.
Miniya Chatterji
Dr. Miniya Chatterji is CEO of Sustain Labs, a company based out of India, France, and New Zealand that turns around large traditional organisations to make them more sustainable. Sustain Labs’ current portfolio consists of large infrastructure companies, leading universities, government infrastructure projects in India, Europe, Africa, and Asia Pacific.
Miniya was Chief Sustainability Officer of Jindal Steel & Power group of companies 2014 - 2017, and prior to that she was in the senior management of the World Economic Forum 2011-2014 in Geneva where she led the WEF in Middle East, North Africa, and South Asia. Before that, Miniya was managing a Eur 200 million hedge fund in Paris for a few years. She started as an investment banker at Goldman Sachs in 2006 in London. Earlier, Miniya worked as policy analyst with Jerome Monod the Chief Counsellor to the President of France Jacques Chirac 2003 - 2006. Miniya is a frequent speaker at Davos and at other World Economic Forum regional summits. She is a Jury Member for the Million Dollar Global Teacher Prize and for The Circulars award that is given away each year at Davos. Miniya is a member of the parliament of Francophone writers.
She is a columnist for The Harvard Business Review, The Indian Express and The Pioneer.
Indian Instincts - essays on freedom and equality in India is Miniya Chatterji’s first book. The book was published by Penguin Random House and launched in India in March 2018. The book is a best seller in India and was reviewed by all leading publications. Additionally, it was launched and distributed in Switzerland, Singapore, and Sri Lanka. The book is being translated in to several languages. The Bengali language edition of the book, published by Sampark Publishing House will be out in November 2019. The French language edition of the book, published by Penguin Random House will be out in April 2020.
Miniya has a PhD from Sciences-po Paris. She was a research fellow at Columbia University and Harvard University. She is a Global Leadership Fellow alumna of the World Economic Forum.
Rakhshanda Jalil
Dr Rakhshanda Jalil is a translator, writer, and literary historian. She has published over 25 books and written over 50 academic papers and essays. Her book on the lesser-known monuments of Delhi, Invisible City, continues to be a bestseller. Her recent works include: Liking Progress, Loving Change: A Literary History of the Progressive Writers Movement in Urdu (OUP, 2014); a biography of Urdu feminist writer Dr Rashid Jahan A Rebel and her Cause (Women Unlimited, 2014); a translation of The Sea Lies Ahead, Intizar Husain's seminal novel on Karachi (Harper Collins, 2015) and Krishan Chandar's partition novel Ghaddar (Westland, 2017); an edited volume of critical writings on Ismat called An Uncivil Woman (Oxford University Press, 2017); and in the past year a literary biography of the Urdu poet Shahryar for Harper Collins; The Great War: Indian Writings on the First World War (Bloomsbury); Preeto & Other Stories: The Male Gaze in Urdu (Niyogi) and Kaifiyat, a translation of Kaifi Azmi’s poems for Penguin Random House and Jallianwala Bagh: Literary Responses in Prose &Poetry (Niyogi Books). Her latest book is But You Don’t Look Like a Muslim (Harper Collins), a collection of 40 essays on religion, culture, literature and identity. She runs an organization called Hindustani Awaaz, devoted to the popularization of Hindi-Urdu literature and culture. Her debut collection of fiction, Release & Other Stories, was published by Harper Collins in 2011, and received critical acclaim. She was awarded the Kaifi Azmi Award for her contribution to Urdu and the First Jawad Memorial Prize for Urdu-Hindi Translation. She writes regularly for major newspapers such as Hindustan Times, Indian Express, The Hindu as well as magazines such as Outlook, Scroll, The Wire, etc. She is the Editor of the Taj magazine, a bi-annual book-length journal of the Taj group of hotels.
Arun Prakash
Admiral Arun Prakash was India’s 20th Naval Chief and served concurrently as Chairman Chiefs of Staff 2004-2006.
A naval aviator by specialization, he commanded a fighter squadron as well as a number of warships, including the aircraft-carrier Viraat. In flag-rank he commanded the Eastern Fleet, the Andaman & Nicobar Joint Command and the Western Naval Command. He served on staff, as head of the navy’s Aviation and Personnel branches, and as the Vice Chief.
Post-retirement, he served two terms in the National Security Advisory Board and headed the National Maritime Foundation. He writes and speaks on maritime and strategic issues and currently holds a Distinguished Chair in India’s Naval War College.
Sujatha Fernandes
Sujatha Fernandes is a writer and professor at the University of Sydney. She is the author of several academic monographs, including most recently Curated Stories: The Uses and Misuses of Storytelling (Oxford). Her literary work includes a memoir on a global hip hop life, Close to the Edge (Verso), and a forthcoming collection of essays entitled The Cuban Hustle (Duke). Her essays and short stories have appeared in The New York Times, The Nation, New Ohio Review, Maine Review, and Aster(ix), among other places. She is currently completing a collection of interlinked short stories entitled Shadow People and is working on a novel about Goan migrants in coastal Karnataka during the colonial wars of the eighteenth century.
Dattaprasad Shetkar
Dattaprasad Shetkar is Goan by birth and heart. He has travelled extensively as a market researcher and brand consultant across India. Since childhood he was drawn towards artistic expression and appreciation, often dabbling into poetry, theatre, debate, elocution and singing. Through Exemplar Strategic Solutions, a firm he co-founded, he has developed strategy and design for many brands and managed events like ‘Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Little Champs’, ‘Jitendra Abhisheki Sangeet Mahotsav’. He founded Susang, a not-for-profit dedicated to art, music and culture, which has revived Konkani poetry and music from 1950s. He is the organiser and curator of TEDxPanaji, an independently organised TED event in Goa.
Mitra Phukan
Mitra Phukan is a writer, translator and columnist who lives in Guwahati, Assam. Her published literary works include four children’s books, a biography, two novels, “The Collector’s Wife” and “A Monsoon of Music”, several volumes of translations of other novels and a collection of fifty of her columns, “Guwahati Gaze”. Her most recent works are a collection of her own short stories, “A Full Night’s Thievery”, (Speaking Tiger 2016) and another translated book, “Aghoni Bai and Other Stories” ( 2019). She writes extensively on Indian music as a reviewer and essayist. Her works have been translated into many languages, and several of her works are taught in colleges and Universities. As a translator herself, she has put across the works of some of the best known writers of fiction in Asomiya into English. Her column “All Things Considered” in The Assam Tribune is very widely read.
Aruna Ganu
Aruna Ganu is a retired teacher, Department of Marathi, from St. Xavier’s College, Mapusa. She is also involved in translation of poems from Hindi to Marathi and has also written weekly columns for a Marathi daily, ‘Goan Varta.’
Dadu Mandrekar
Dadu Mandrekar is an Ambedkarite activist, writer, poet, photographer, journalist, and editor of two journals Prajasattak and Paryavaran. He has authored many books, including Bahishkrut Gomantak (a survey and study of Goan Dalits), Shapit Surya (a poetry collection), Satyacha Shodh (a study of the Buddha), Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar: Antarashtriya mahatva ani mahatmya (a study of Dr B R Ambedkar), Bharatiya Savidhan: Antarashtriya Prabhav ani Parinam (On the importance of the Indian Constitution) and two more poetry collections: Umbartha and Onjal Lavachi. His book Shapit Surya won the Goa Marathi Academy literary award, while Bahishkrut Gomantak won the Mahatma Phule ani Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar Vichar Pracharak Sanstha literary award. He has won many other awards, for literary works, civil rights, and handicraft production as well, including the Namdeo Dhasal Kavya Puraskar for poetry, Sanvidhan Ratna Puraskar for work on the constitution, Goa Sudarop America award for civil rights, Norman Dantas award for transformative work in Goa, Samrat Ashoka Smriti Mahanayak award from the Mahanayak newspaper, and First Class Award in Handicrafts from the Directorate of Industries and Mines, Goa.
