About Us - Tata Literature Live!

ABOUT TATA LITERATURE LIVE!

Tata Literature Live! is Mumbai’s largest international literary festival. Featuring authors, poets, thought leaders and more it is an intelectually stimulating event for people of all ages. The types of sessions include from book launches, panel discussions, straight talks, debates, performances and workshops – for both, kids and adults.

The tenth edition of the festival will take place from Thursday, 14th November to Sunday, 17th November 2019 in 3 locations across the city of Mumbai. N.C.P.A in South Mumbai, S.P.I.C.E in Bandra West and Prithvi in Juhu.

DIRECTOR’S NOTE

Tata Literature Live! The Mumbai LitFest is 10 years old! When we open our doors on November 14, it will be to a landmark event. Some of you will have grown ten years older with us; some of you will be here for the first time. To all of you, our ever growing audience, we say welcome and thank you.

I remember the day the distinguished trio of Mumbai citizens, Gerson da Cunha, Sheilu Srinivasan and Padmini Mirchandani asked me, ‘Shouldn’t our city have an international literary festival?’ Yes, of course I said, ours is India’s most cosmopolitan city with a wonderful literary tradition, so Mumbai must have a litfest. “So you will do it?” they said in unison. After a moment’s thought (which lasted two days), I said ‘Why not?’ After all, how difficult would it be to organise a festival? Ring a few authors, get a sponsor or two, draw up a schedule, and you are ready to go. We all learn things the hard way.

The most incredible part of this decade long journey is what has not changed. Most of the Literature Live! team that works on the festival and makes it happen has been together right through the years. That’s a wonderful advertisement for team spirit and commitment to the cause. I am not mentioning them individually but you will find the team members on this website. They deserve our applause. As does our Advisory Board, in particular Georgina Brown, Saumya Balsari and Sid Khanna who have gone out of their way to help.

Without the Tata group, the festival couldn’t possibly take place on the scale and of the quality that has been maintained through the decade. No sponsor could possibly be as supportive, and as willing to go along with us on the expansion of the festival, adding first, the Prithvi Theatre complex and then St Paul’s Institute complex last year so that the festival is now in three geographical locations of Mumbai — Nariman Point, Bandra and Juhu. Tata’s R Gopalakrishnan was our starting point, then came Mukund Rajan and now Harish Bhat, all of them have embraced the festival warmly and completely. Atul Agrawal, supported by Jayaa Sapkale, has been the Tata team that has worked with the festival all through the ten years, taking the rough with the smooth in their stride.

The National Centre for Performing Arts is not just our main venue: it’s a vital part of the festival. Khushroo Suntook, NCPA’s Chairman, has been the most supportive ally you could hope to find, and the NCPA team works with us for the festival tirelessly and without complaint (even when a couple of years ago, an insistent crowd pushed the closed glass door of Experimental Theatre so hard that it broke down!) We started with just one auditorium at NCPA; ten years later we use as many as 6 spaces in the complex!

Last, but not least, there’s the QTP team which brings youthful energy and immense organisation skills to the clock-work running of the festival. Finally, if you like this website and our Social Media posts and comments, the work is done by the young Method team.

Every year, we make additions to our litfest: this year there are two. The first is the Little Festival, a festival for children of NGO-assisted schools who will be at NCPA and Prithvi over two days. I am sure they will add much colour and vibrancy to the litfest. The other addition is the Open Air Plaza, NCPA’s delightful green space which will now give a festive air to our event.

A literary festival can only be as good as the people who participate in it. Take a look at the writers and performers who will be part of our lives for four days. It’s a wonderful list, promising much food for thought. In fact, a veritable feast!

COMMITTEE

ANIL DHARKER

Festival Director

Anil Dharker is a Mumbai-based writer and columnist. At various stages in his life, he has been an engineer on the academic staff of the University of Glasgow, a consultant in a Mumbai architectural firm, a film critic and censor, a promoter of New Cinema with the National Film Development Corporation and an editor successively, ofDebonair, Mid-Day and Sunday Mid-Day, The Independent,and The Illustrated Weekly of India. Dharker has worked in television as producer and anchor, as well as head of a news television channel, then poised for takeoff. He was also, briefly, creative director of the Zee Television network. He is still remembered for his long stint as TV critic at The Sunday Observer, where readers, viewers, producers, Doordarshan directors-general and ministers found his column the one they loved to hate. These were reprinted in an anthology by HarperCollins titled Sorry Not Ready:Television in the Time of PMdarshan. Dharker has written a coffee-table book on Goa; a biography of industrialist OP Jindal, The Man Who Talked To Machines; and a book on Mahatma Gandhi’s Dandi March, The Romance Of Salt. Recently, he brought out an anthology, Icons: The Men & Women Who Shaped Today’s India.

Shashi Baliga

Executive Festival Director

Shashi Baliga is an independent journalist and media trainer. Her last assignment was as Editor, Sunday Features with the Hindustan Times, Mumbai. She has also been Editor of Filmfare magazine, worked with The Independent and The Metropolis on Saturday papers and Femina and Savvy magazines. She lectures on journalism at the Xavier Institute of Communication and SPICE in Mumbai. She has contributed a chapter to A Book of Light, edited by Jerry Pinto – a collection of personal accounts of living with a loved one with mental illness.

AMY FERNANDES

Associate Festival Director

She is an independent journalist, having been Editor of Femina, and later Editor, Features with a daily publication. She is passionate about magazine journalism and has brought out as many as five publications at a time

ANTOINE LEWIS

Associate Festival Director, Head Programming

Antoine Lewis is a Food & Wine writer and columnist. His love of good food is matched by his love for digging into the origins of dishes and the cultural practices and histories that shape what we eat and why. Apart from being a regular contributor to a variety of national and international newspapers, magazines and websites he has been the Editor of Savvy Cookbook, Food & Drink Editor, Paprika Media and Editor of burrp.com.

Quasar Thakore Padamsee

Associate Festival Director, Head Performances

Q is a theatreholic. A director, producer, trainer and, most importantly, avid watcher of all things theatrical. In the past he has been curator of the theatre section for the Kala Ghoda Festival, Prithvi Festival platforms and the Mumbai Theatre Utsav. Internationally he has worked on Tim Supple’s critically acclaimed A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Toby Gough’s smash hit The Merchants of Bollywood and most recently, the aerial drama Mind Walking. In Bombay his plays Project S.t.r.i.p. and Khatijabai of Karmali Terrace have been running for many years.

Dr. Vinod Kumar Budhiraja

Associate Festival Director, Head Travel & Hospitality

Dr Vinod Kumar Budhiraja I.T.S is an independent telecom professional who has been employed in both the public and private sector in India and abroad. Over his long career he has been General Manager of MTNL; General Manager Telecom, Kashmir; a member of the Executive Committee of Association of Business Communication of India (ABCI) and the Chairman of the Public Relations Society of India, Bombay Chapter (PRSI).

Reena Agrawal

Committee Member

When Reena is not teaching Sociology to students of mass media , she is telling stories to children who challenge and help explore her own possibilities .

As Co Founder of Storyexpress she supports education of the lesser privileged through books, reading and music. A struggling Indian classical instrumental player, she is still trying to hit the right notes!

Shireen Mistry

Committee Member

A graduate of the universities of Bombay and Oxford, Shireen Mistry first worked as a journalist and then for over twenty years was the British Deputy High Commission’s spokesperson and Head of its Political, Communications and Public Affairs Department for Western India. She has been awarded an MBE ( a British government award) for her contribution to strengthening Indo-UK ties.

Tina Nagpaul

Committee Member

Tina Nagpaul is a filmmaker who has produced and written feature films as well as content for web and television. She is currently in the process of directing her first documentary feature. In a prior life, she was an accidental banker with Citigroup but spent her free time immersed in the creative culture of New York and Los Angeles. She has a Bachelors in Physics and Astronomy from Mount Holyoke College and a masters in Public Policy from Georgia Tech.