Jaipur Diary

There is a distinctive saffron presence in the crowds. Swami Agnivesh — the activist and spiritual leader — turns heads wherever he goes. Followers and admirers surround him for photographs,touch his feet and shake hands with him. The Swami,who recently did a stint in Bigg Boss Season 5,will launch a book in Jaipur on Wednesday evening. “I arrived here on Sunday and have been attending various sessions since then,” he says. On the Salman Rushdie controversy,he says,

“Islamic fundamentalists banned his book without reading a word of it; at least allow the man to come for the literature festival.”

Literary Celebs

Are authors the new Bollywood stars? Some of them,yes actually. Chetan Bhagat has been a big crowd-puller. At a discussion on “Survival Strategies at the Time of the Twitterati” on Sunday,when moderator Shoma Choudhary mistakenly pronounced Bhagat’s latest book as being “Revolution 2010”,hundreds of people,corrected her in unison — Revolution 2020. But Bhagat has tough competition from David Remnick,author and editor-in-chief of The New Yorker. Immediately after Remnick’s second session on Sunday,titled “Journalism as Literature”,young women rushed to the bookstall to pick up his works,with The Bridge: The Life and Rise of Barack Obama on top of their list. They stood in line,sharing notes about the “tall,strapping,eloquent,well-read and witty” man.

…and They Missed It

Pulitzer Prize winner Annie Proulx was supposed to be the highlight of Day Four,on January 23,owing to her participation in two sessions — “The Art of Short Story”,and “Adaptations”. However,inclement weather forced her to call off her India visit. Another absentee on the same day was Hari Kunzru,who was supposed to chair “The Art of Short Story”. Since he had to leave the country,Booker Prize winner Michael Ondaatje was called on to fill in for him at the last moment.