Our workshop was part of this ongoing effort to explore creativity, writing for children and to discuss the need for children’s literature in Indian languages. This is the largest group we have handled in a workshop.The large majority was from the Education Department and many of those students were to begin their field work of teaching in a school. This was also the workshop where we got to know some participants only from their eyes and voice!
It was an amazing experience to work with students from Jharkhand, Bihar, UP, Kashmir and Andhra Pradesh and Telangana.
Apart from the mellifluous strains of Urdu, we also heard many lovely lilting accents of the same language. We also heard Anis Sahab issue corrections to ensure that they used the right words to write. The students were game to try writing triggers PBees Mala Kumar and Manisha Chaudhry threw at them in Hindi and English also! Many of them illustrated their stories with no prompting from us. Poonam Girdhani, a talented dastango (storyteller) who waxes eloquence in Urdu, kept them nimble by pointing out the pitfalls of using stereotypes, if they wanted to be truly creative. PBee Rajesh Khar was the living example of a pan-Indian identity and he would underline that every now and then by throwing open his arms in true Titanic style!
With a combination of large and small group work, we certainly brought down some barriers between departments, genders and accent! A direst and impressively quick impact of the workshop has been that the students have formed a Readers and Writer’s Club that will meet every fortnight to read out their writing over tea and samosas. They have demanded and got a Wall space for a magazine.
The workshop marks an important beginning. We hope it will be the first of many such because we need to talk about children’s literature in Indian languages among the people who will be the educators and administrators of tomorrow.