An evening with the living legend Pt Birju Maharaj and his romance with Kathak

Photo Caption:

Photo - Pt Birju Maharaj in conversation with Shinjini Kulkarni during Ek Mulakat session by Prabha Khaitan Foundation

30^th July 2020, Mumbai: Prabha Khaitan Foundation, an organization that is dedicated to the socio-cultural welfare and humanitarian cause has through a virtual session of their initiative Ek Mulakat in association with SWAR brought together Kathak maestro Pt Birju Maharaj and his disciple Vidushi Saswati Sen in conversation with the maestro’s granddaughter Shinjini Kulkarni  who is also a kathak dancer to take the audience on an enchanting journey of his life, art and work. The Prabha Khaitan Foundation is devoted towards the promotion of performing arts, culture and literature, and collaborates with caregivers, committed individuals and like-minded institutions to implement cultural, educational, literary and social welfare projects in India. Ek Mulakat provides a platform to eminent personalities from the various segments of the society to share their stories.

Throughout the hour-long engaging session, the maestro reminisced events and episodes from his life that have left a mark on his mind. He spoke on his lifelong love affair with kathak. From 

Speaking on his Lucknow connect, Pt Birju Maharaj said, “I still pray that I get to go to Lucknow and work with the people there. Everything about Lucknow is engraved in my brain like an image.”

On his inception of his ideas, he added, “

Vidushi Saswati Sen, added, “

Shinjini Kulkarni, added,

The Foundation’s vision to promote and recognise talent from different walks of life has led them to arrange immaculately curated literary sessions in about 30 cities across the country. Encouraged by the response in India, the Foundation has also forayed into the global arena with a bouquet of sessions. They have hosted some of the greatest stalwarts from the world of words, even as they are focused on creating a platform for aspiring talent. Each session carried a different flavour and spread a different essence. Previously, an array of distinguished and influential personalities has been a part of Ek Mulakat sessions such as Dr Shashi Tharoor, Javed Akhtar, Ashish Vidyarthi, Dr Sonal Mansingh, Dia Mirza, Usha Uthup, Nandita Das, Baroness Sandip Verma, Bittu Sahgal, Sudarshan Pattanaik and many more. Now Prabha Khaitan Foundation has taken this initiative to the virtual platform owing to the pandemic starting with Shri Kailash Satyarthi.

About Prabha Khaitan Foundation: Prabha Khaitan Foundation is dedicated to the socio-cultural welfare and humanitarian cause. It is a non-profit trust founded by Late Dr. Prabha Khaitan. Based in Kolkata, the Foundation promotes performing arts, culture and literature, and collaborates with caregivers, committed individuals and like-minded institutions to implement cultural, educational, literary and social welfare projects in India. The Foundation supports the UNESCO view that cultural development has the potential to be an alternative way of promoting sustainable development in poor rural communities, especially in the third-world countries. Based in Kolkata, for them culture stands for language, music, literature, visual arts, dance, drama, oral traditions, and traditional practices. The objective of the foundation is to create an enabling structure and promote networking so that communities engage with each other to work towards building positive self-esteem, inspire creativity and pro- mote culture and knowledge.