Jalandhar: Keeping the city’s literary scene alive
Jalandhar: For the past six years, writer, book lover and psychotherapist Nupur Sandhu has been striving to keep the city’s literary scene alive. Since 2019, when she started doing the Yayavar Literary Festival, Nupur has been encouraging the younger generation to inculcate the habit of reading. She has been associated with reading clubs of various schools and colleges in Jalandhar by organising activities for them. The events organised by her allow students to read a number of books and listen to podcasts of authors and motivational speakers. Her Yayavar group has also organised activities in collaboration with several literary forums in the city. The group has done some activities in collaboration with Lovely Professional University and IK Gujral Punjab Technical University in its two editions.
Recently, it has started associating with reading clubs and literary societies of Kanya Mahavidyalaya, Hans Raj Mahila Mahavidyalaya, Doaba College, Government Sports College, Dr BR Ambedkar National Institute of Technology, Lyallpur Khalsa College and Cantonment Board School. The annual literary festivals organised by Nupur are eagerly awaited by people, as she uses all her contacts to bring the best speakers and motivational experts to the audience. Being the wife of an Army officer, Nupur Sandhu is quite outspoken and very quick to strike a chord with people around her. “My aim is to give a vision to the youth and give them wings to fly. Apart from Jalandhar, I am also conducting events in Jammu. Our activities got stuck to some extent during the Covid times, when we could only conduct online events,” she informed.
The 8th edition of the festival will be held on April 5 at KL Sehgal Memorial Hall. About the event, Nupur informed, “There will be a panel of experts from the Army, sports and people, who will discuss crime mysteries, matters of relationships, inspirational stories, ghost stories and poetry. The dignitaries will include people from Mumbai, Dehradun, Jammu and parts of Punjab, who will address and discuss the books.” Poet and filmmaker Vineet KKN Panchhi will be the keynote speaker. Kritika Khanna, the first woman para-rower, will be the inaugural speaker. Brigadier Rajiv Mahana (Retd), Vineet K Bansal, Jai Alani, Lt Gen JS Cheema, Dr Kanwalpreet Kaur, RAW agent Lucky Singh Bisht, Anita Krishnan, Vandana Singla, Navdeep Gill, Vikram Singh, Kalpana Singla, Shefali Arora, Dr Jas Kohli, Chetan Batra, Ravi Sandhu and Sanjeev Bansal will be the other speakers. There will also be a dance drama by Vibhuti Jain and Shivom Chopra.
