Mumbai Diary: Friday Dossier

Pic/Ashish Raje

Bappa's ring-side view

Ganesh idols line this street in Dadar, awaiting to be taken home by devotees.

Khaki will welcome green

Headed by social activist Amit Ajgaonkar, the tree plantation initiative Ped Lagao Ped Bachao and cycling project Cycle Chala City Bacha have come together to plant trees in the compounds of 96 police stations across the city. The idea is to turn these police stations into ‘green stations'. In addition to this, the project will also provide the police officers stationed within these areas with free mental-health sessions. "Having lived in Dadar since 1995, I've seen many trees being chopped down overnight. I feel the next generation will not have a healthy life if we don't do something like this. While urbanisation is an important aspect of development, there must be a balance in nature. It will be really difficult for future generations to sustain if we don't take these steps," said Ajgaonkar. The project began on September 8 and several trees have already been planted in the compound of the Dadar Police Station, with plantations planned in other areas soon. "Our next stop is the police station in Mahim," added Ajgaonkar.

Putting people with profit

The 115th Foundation Day celebrations of the IMC Chamber of Commerce & Industry were marked recently. Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, executive chairperson, Biocon, said at the Foundation Day address over Zoom, "The focus of business has now shifted to building a durable foundation for sustainable social development." Shaw called this compassionate capitalism (CC).

Shaw's address took this reporter right back to 2010 when Infosys chief Narayan Murthy had spoken about his philosophy of CC to a wide-eyed young audience at an institute in Matunga. In these dark days it is good to know industry leaders are talking of the new way of business, where people come above or at least go along with profit. We hope more corporates say, compassionate capitalism? Well, CC me on it.

A musical call

The Symphony Orchestra of India (SOI) is seeking Indian composers to submit works to be performed by their musicians. "The SOI has always worked to provide a platform to showcase musical talent. Our Call for Composers is another step in this direction allowing us to present the work of talented local composers to a larger audience. We've had a good number of responses so far with a diverse range of works submitted," said Marat Bisengaliev, music director of SOI. To apply, send a PDF score and audio (MP3) of your composition with a copy of the first and last pages of your passport/OCI card to soi@ncpamumbai.com by September 12. To know more, visit soimumbai.com.

Make way for art

Art newsletter The Alipore Post has partnered up with the ReReeti Foundation and seven museums across the country, to host a unique week-long art challenge from September 13 to 19, which invites artists of all levels of expertise to send in their entries. "We wanted to keep things really fun. We've picked out words from artworks in these museums as prompts for the artists to create their art around. We'll be posting these works, on a daily basis" Rohini Kejriwal, founder of Alipore Post, told this diarist.

Hey there DJ, play that song again

After what seems like a whole century, India is finally ready to welcome a travelling international DJ for the first time since the pandemic hit. Events company Paradox is bringing down big-ticket Russian artiste Nina Kraviz (in pic) in December to as-yet-undisclosed cities. Speaking about the development, Romario Rodrigues of music and art company Kranti Art Theory shared, "As a promoter, it's exciting to see such a big name, and it's a really nice way to end the year."