shunashir sen shunashir. sen@ mid- day. com There is an iconic Bengali book called Thakumar Jhuli in which a grandmother ( thakuma) picks out stories from a bag ( jhuli) and narrates them to the reader. These tales are often so fantastical that you are transported to a different world thatu2019s populated by speaking animals and demons, among other mythical creatures. They have been an essential component of a Bengaliu2019s childhood for generations now, with similar pieces of literature spread out across India. And Lopamudra Mohanty, founder of Big Buddy World u2014 a platform that aims to inculcate the habit of reading in children u2014 now wants to spread this wealth of stories through the second edition of an event called Indian Language Storytelling Mandala. The weekend session will involve people from different parts of the country narrating stories in their mother tongue. All one has to do is send an email to the address listed below with details of the story they have chosen. Each selected storyteller gets seven minutes and only when they complete narrating it in its original language, do they tell the audience in English or Hindi what the story was actually about. u201c A lot is lost in translation when you tell an Indian story in English, and the idea here is to initially get at least a gist of what the narrative is about,u201d Mohanty tells us. But she adds that children u2014 and sometimes even adults u2014 are losing touch with their native languages thanks to the misconception that you need to speak in English to be modern or cool. Mohanty says, u201c There was once a storyteller who shared a story in Sindhi, and later came up to me and said, u2018 I am so ashamed because I donu2019t know the script of my own language. What am I going to teach my children?u2019 So whatu2019s happening these days is that the present generation is losing connect with their own culture, and that is a dangerous thing to happen.u201d Indeed it is, so if u2014 like Thakuma u2014 you, too, have a metaphorical bag of stories to pick from, carry it along to this event and invite listeners into your own fantastical, literary world. ON February 22, 4.30 pm AT Kalpataru Estate, Poonam Nagar Road, Andheri East. Email bigbuddyworld@ gmail. com event From Indiau2019s insides A storytelling event over the weekend will focus on narrating tales in regional Indian languages Lopamudra Mohanty narrating a story in Odia

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