The second day of the Dehradun Community literature Festival (DClF) at WIC India saw interactive sessions with noted author Devdutt Pattanaik and additional solicitor general Pinky Anand on Friday.
Pattanaik and Jerry Johnson discussed the topic ‘Themes of love: Tracing lGBT in literature’. The author elaborated that there are three genders - males, females and hermaphrodites. He stated that there is variety in nature which all are not very comfortable with. Speaking about the third gender and its acceptance in mythology, he said, “Ram had also accepted the third gender and had commented that Ram-Rajya cannot be complete until they do not return to Ayodhya.” Pattanaik also shared several anecdotes from mythology to explain the concept of ‘Brahmacharya’ (celibacy) and ‘Grihast Ashram’ (marriage).
In the following session on ‘A living Past: History and Environment’, Nanditha Krishna and Abhijay Negi discussed history’s impact on environment.
Nanditha spoke about how plants and trees have been attached with sacred significance in order to preserve them. This was also done not only to save the environment but also because these plants and trees have medicinal value. She appealed to the audience to adopt the Swachchh Bharat Mission and resolve to not use non biodegradable products.
later in the afternoon, additional solicitor general of India, Pinky Anand was in conversation with Saif Mahmood on 'law and literature'. She said that it is important to be a thinker, activist and philosopher in order to be a good lawyer.
The fourth session of the day was held on ‘The Himalaya and Indian literature’ with Stephen Alter and lokesh Ohri as the speakers. later authors Manjari Prabhu, Nanditha Krishna, Roshen Dalal and Jaskiran Chopra conducted a session on ‘The Journey: The story of women writers in Indian History, Religion and literature’.