Keeping up with Kolkata

Yesterday afternoon had a meeting with the Calcutta Chamber of Commerce officials regarding the Prabha Khaitan Puraskar that was constituted by the corpus donated by Prabha Khaitan Foundation when my mother became the first lady president of the Chamber. This Award is conferred on women and past recipients include, Shabana Azmi, Vandana Shiva, Kapila Vatsyayan, Medha Patekar and others. This year the function would be on 22nd June and the Award would be conferred on Shanu Lahiri. The Governor of West Bengal Shri M K Narayanan would be gracing the occasion as the Chief Guest.

In the evening met Shiladitya Ganguly at Flury’s regarding NABC in the USA next month and also fixed up a date with him and some other friends for dinner that was long due. We both discussed the increasing number Bangla film festivals in the USA. Today evening I went to Harrington Street Art Centre and then to the Star Jalsa Award Function in which the artists’ forum was also involved. Apart from the other regular friends Dona and Saurabh Ganguly, Pauli Dam, Locket and Aparna Sen, I met Mamata Shankar after a long time (file picture).

I was scheduled to attend the National Day of Russian Federation at The Park Hotel from 7:30 pm to 9:30 pm but I could not say no to my personal friend Neelanjanaa whose company Blue Air has produced the show. Managed to reach The Park at about 9:20 pm and met the Russian diplomats and few others who are regular at the consulate parties.

I wanted to go to Tollygunge Club for the program A World of Joy showcasing one of Tagore’s creation conceptualised by Sujoy Prosad Chatterjee in association with the Times of India. Somehow I have not been able to attend any of Sujoy’s programs I have been invited to for the past two years.

Tomorrow I am flying to Bangkok.

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