Spotlight Archives

            SWAHA, CUTTACK, 1990s In the small, sleepy town of Cuttack, summer is long. Too long or so they say. The sun glares down at you, the sweat sticks to your skin and there is little you can do outside. I don’t remember the heat so much because I escaped into a different world through books.   Growing up in a joint family with 20 members at any given point and more in a state of influx, I craved a space for myself, for my dreams to soar. They did – through the hundreds of books I borrowed from my school library and the personal collection of my father’s cousin. When I was in the middle of a book, I became anti-social - at least my mother complained that I did. Time, space and people did not matter.   ...

Usha Mukunda in conversation with Vivek Vellanki This conversation is an edited version of a podcast originally featured as part of Dialoging Education, a podcast developed by the Regional Resource Centre for Elementary Education, University of Delhi. As an 8-year-old I eagerly waited for that one hour every week we used to get to spend in our school’s library. I had memorized the chore. We would all stand in a line outside our class, with fingers on our lips. The librarian, Rukmini Ma’am, would walk us to the library. All the while, there would be murmurs along the way; do you think the Hardy Boys solved the mystery? I am going to finish reading that story about Shikari Shambu today; I can’t wait to find out what happens to Harry Potter once he gets off the train. The library wa...