How Aakhar Dakshin celebrates southern languages

Aakhar Dakshin Festival of South Indian languages

“The southern scene is such a magical part of India as a whole. One doesn’t really need an excuse to celebrate southern languages, do they?” asks Shinie Antony, curator of Aakhar Dakshin: A Festival of South Indian languages, that will be held in Bengaluru on April 22.

The festival is organised by the Prabha Khaitan Foundation, a Kolkata-based non-profit trust focused on promoting art, education, culture and women’s empowerment, founded by writer, entrepreneur and feminist, the late Prabha Khaitan. According to Shinie, the Foundation’s Aakhar initiative which focuses on promoting regional language writers, has often brought them to the South. However, “This is the first time they are doing a South Indian languages festival,” she writes in an email interview. 

Aakhar Dakshin will be inaugurated by Chandrashekara Kambara, former president of the Sahitya Akademi. Some of the writers who will be part of the festival include Damodar Mauzo, Perumal Murugan, K. Satchidanandan, K.R. Meera, Vivek Shanbhag, Kannan Sundaram and Vasudhendra. Journalists and editors such as Stanley Carvalho, Nisha Susan, Purnima Tammireddy, Ajitha GS and Karthik Venkatesh will also participate in this festival. The event will showcase poetry readings by Mamta Sagar, Prathibha Nandakumar and Ramesh Karthik Nayak among others, as well as classical dance performances by Yamini Reddy (Kuchipudi) and Shinjini Kulkarni (Kathak). 

Poet-author K. Satchidanandan, who writes in both English and Malayalam, points out that the languages and literature of South India have shared histories and common identity markers despite regional differences. “It is important that writers from these languages come together to exchange their works and ideas, which in a way is also an act of assertion and resistance in these troubled times,” he says, about the event. 

It is also, as Kannada writer Vasudhendra points out, a way to recognise and preserve the legacy of these languages and their culture. Shinie agrees, “Indian writing in English is just a few decades old, but the sheer amount of literary output produced in regional languages is simply tremendous.” She adds, “With the best translations, our regional languages are being universalised and how. These books are galloping across the world, especially with the International Booker winners and long-listers now including Hindi and Tamil writers.Their stories are now being read everywhere.” 

Aakhar Dakshin: A Festival of South Indian Languages will be held at the Bangalore International Centre, Domlur on April 22, between 10 am and 7.30 pm. Entry free.