Last month the House of Lords saw a colourful occasion that was also history in the making – for English language poets of the Indian diaspora.
The celebratory evening was hosted at the House of Lords by Lord Bhikhu Parekh, himself a distinguished Indian diaspora non-fiction writer, and a Patron of the Word Masala Foundation and poet Yogesh Patel, the Founder-Director of non-profit Word Masala Foundation. The event was his brainchild. The ambitious event with a tightly packed programme that included speeches, book launches, poetry readings, award ceremonies, slide presentation and networking, attracted some sixty people, including well-established as well as rising poets, poetry publishers and journalists.
In his welcome address, Yogesh Patel stated his intention of bringing together and honouring eminent Indian diaspora poets from Britain and the USA, as well as some insightful British publishers who support diaspora poetry.
A coup that he was particularly proud of was a publishing contract for Isle of Man-based Usha Kishore whose next poetry collection will be brought out by Eyewear Publishing.
Zata Banks treated the gathering to an inspirational keynote speech on the ‘creative opportunities at the intersections of poetry and film’. Zata is the founder of Poetry Film, an influential research art project that was launched in 2002 and has an archive collection of over 1000 films.
Lord Parekh and Baroness Usha Prashar presented awards to poets: Meena Alexander, Usha Akella, and, in absentia, Saleem Peeradina and Pramila Venkateswaran; as well as Shanta Acharya, Siddhartha Bose, Kavita Jindal, Daljit Nagra, Usha Kishore, Reginald Massey and Debjani Chatterjee. A wonderfully exciting award of a different kind was Word Masala’s first Crowd-Funding Award, given to Mona Dash to support the publication of her next poetry collection.
By Dr Debjani Chatterjee MBE Last month the House of Lords saw a colourful occasion that was also history in the making – for English language poets of the Indian diaspora. The celebratory evening was hosted at the House of Lords by Lord Bhikhu Parekh, himself a distinguished Indian diaspora non-fiction writer, and a Patron of the Word Masala Foundation and poet Yogesh Patel, the Founder-Director of non-profit Word Masala Foundation. The event was his brainchild. The ambitious event with a tightly packed programme that included speeches, book launches, poetry readings, award ceremonies, slide presentation and networking, attracted some sixty people, including well-established as well as rising poets, poetry publishers and journalists. In his welcome address, Yogesh Patel stated his intention of bringing together and honouring eminent Indian diaspora poets from Britain and the USA, as well as some insightful British publishers who support diaspora poetry. A coup that he was particularly proud of was a publishing contract for Isle of Man-based Usha Kishore whose next poetry collection will be brought out by Eyewear Publishing. Zata Banks treated the gathering to an inspirational keynote speech on the ‘creative opportunities at the intersections of poetry and film’. Zata is the founder of Poetry Film, an influential research art project that was launched in 2002 and has an archive collection of over 1000 films. Lord Parekh and Baroness Usha Prashar presented awards to poets: Meena Alexander, Usha Akella, and, in absentia, Saleem Peeradina and Pramila Venkateswaran; as well as Shanta Acharya, Siddhartha Bose, Kavita Jindal, Daljit Nagra, Usha Kishore, Reginald Massey and Debjani Chatterjee. A wonderfully exciting award of a different kind was Word Masala’s first Crowd-Funding Award, given to Mona Dash to support the publication of her next poetry collection.
[Dr Debjani Chatterjee MBE has had sixty+ books published in various countries and won many prizes for poetry, literary translation and writing for children.]
