Mumbai Diary: Thursday Dossier

Pic/Atul Kamble

The bear who stared

With his parents in tow, a young boy poses with a bear sculpture at Veermata Jijabai Bhosale Udyan and Zoo in Byculla.

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Dr Raju Kasambe

Bombay Natural History Society (BNHS) has good news for avid birders. They are now accepting applications for this year's basic ornithology certificate course of 11 months, birder Dr Raju Kasambe, assistant director of conservation education, BNHS, said, "The course will follow a hybrid format with webinars and field visits. The idea is to teach people about spotting birds in urban spaces and noticing their behavioural patterns." Interested folk can check out bnhs.org to sign up for this programme.

A previous batch of birders on a field visit. Pic courtesy/BNHS

Peek into Panvel's history

A picture taken 20 years ago shows Panvel's Devale talav and the two dargahs that guard its perimeter

Presented by the Research Centre of The Asiatic Society of Mumbai, Pages from Panvel is a lecture by Dr Smita Dalvi that will put the suburb in the spotlight as a port town and trading centre in the North Konkan. "Over the years, we've carried out surveys and identified local heritage that were of regional and local importance in the town. When the heritage fades away, it's not just the physical structures that disappear but also the memories that are erased," shared Dalvi. The lecture will focus on the significance of local history and heritage, and the need to preserve it. "We also found that there were a dozen manmade talavs in the region, but what grabbed our attention was that each talav was associated with a place of worship of different faiths," she told us. The lecture will be held in the society's Durbar Hall on July 27 at 5 pm.

For Premchand

Have you too, like this diarist, been charmed by Premchand's luminous writing? If yes, you might want to attend Jashn-e-Premchand - an evening of dramatised readings of his works. An effort by Indian literary arts platform Katha Kathan, the session slated for next weekend to commemorate the writer's 142nd birth anniversary will witness filmmaker Vishal Bhardwaj read out Thakur ka Kuan. "Having attended a Hindi-medium school, I understand the value of Hindustani literature. Had I not read Premchand, Muktibodh, Agyeya, Nirmal Varma, Nirala, Manto or Ismat Chughtai, I would have missed beautiful things in life. I will be joining Katha Kathan to make literature available in various forms to people and the youth of this country," Bhardwaj shared. Stories such as Prem ka Uday and Gulli-danda will also be narrated in the session.

Taking the choral route

The Mehli Mehta Music Foundation, which promotes Western classical music among children and adults through its all-women choir, music education and early music development programmes is ready to kiss Zoom classes goodbye. Recently, the organisation announced resuming in-person classes after two years of virtual classes, urging students and newcomers to gather at their Breach Candy and Cumballa Hill centres. Simona Kaur, administrative head of the education programmes, stressed on the importance of learning music in person, as much of the nuances and quality of notes are incomprehensible in digital classes. "Gathered together, members in the choir can hear and understand the harmonies better, which makes a difference to the learning curve," she told us. New students keen to join any of their programmes can sign up for it at mmmfindia.org until July-end.

A moment from a 2019 performance by the choir at NCPA

Talking sex in Indian classrooms

A recent collaboration between Agents of Ishq (AOI) - a website that focuses on sexuality, love and desire, and The Gender Lab - a platform trying to bridge the widening gender gap found 35 educators discussing the need for sex education in schools. Debasmita Das (inset) from AOI told this diarist, "The participating teachers were from metros and also, tier-2 cities. We learnt that the absence of sex-ed in our own growing up years means that teachers are not well-equipped to deal with diverse situations and questions they are faced with." The idea is to start a conversation on why students need pleasure-based sex-ed to cope with what's actually happening in their lives. To know about other observations of the workshop, head to @agentsofishq.