2 Days Times LitFest begins with heated conversations on Kashmir, Secularism and more

New Delhi : Today, the fourth edition of Times Literature Festival-Delhi, commonly known as “Times LitFest” begin at India Habitat Centre.

The Times Literature Festival-Delhi, which is organized by “The Times of India” annually, provides an electrifying platform for a lively exchange of views on literature, books and ideas. The Festival attracts authors, poets, theatre artists, lyricists, scriptwriters, filmmakers and thinkers from across the country and the world.

The fest begin with a debate on “Article 370 : Kashmir and it’s Future” amongst BJP and Congress leaders.

Speaking at the debate Salman Kurshid said “You cannot close public services on the name of National security as we are living in a democratic country. I would like to ask that why public representatives were not allowed to visit kashmir. If this kind of treatment will be given to kashmir than future of Kashmir will be terrible”

The most interesting debate was on the topic, “Why India shifted rightwards: India after 2019” featuring Rajdeep Sardesai. During the debate, one panelist, Prafull Ketar, said, “Thinking in binary – Right and Left, is unIndian, not anti-Indian”. During the debate, a heated argument erupted between Rajdeep Sardesai and Swapan Dasgupta while discussing at topic.

Rajdeep said, “We are dismantling the constitution of India by reducing parliament just to a notice board.”

“The question to ask before even referring to idealogy is if there is even a shift towards the right at all or not,” responded Swapan Dasgupta.

Another session which witnessed interesting discussions was on the topic, “Yogi or Bhogi …. What should a king be?” with the renowned mythology expert Devdutt Pattanaik. He told ” We live in the world of assumption and assumption form foundations of life.

On the lighter note when the moderator of the conversation asked, Has your book on How to become rich has helped you? Devdutt said ‘Yes, Mythology helped me get a rent free, debt free flat in Bandra.’

The Bad man of the Bollywood Gulshan Grover along with the Mahima Chaudhry also graced the event. For that, the name of session was also “Bad man with Beauty”. In the session, Gulshan Grover, talked about his newly published biography ‘Bad Man’.

Answering the question “Where are you?” regarding Mahima not hiting silver screen, Mahima Chaudhry replied “I’m not being offered any roles. So, maybe I will have to produce myself.”

Talking about her personality she said
“I had those personality traits, I was moody but I didn’t give up even after my accident. It would have been easier in today’s digital world to garner support. ”

Answering a question of public on why women are thrown out of films by just excusing that the heroin doing so much of tantrums she said “We need a kind of a HR department or a union in the film industry to protect our rights, I think like it does in Hollywood”

Talking about his films Gulshan Grover reveled that he might be working in one of the Bond films soon.