New Delhi: The Delhi Literature Festival was organised from 8-10^th February, the seventh edition of three days Festival at the Dilli Haat, INA. The Delhi Literature Festival 2019 was inaugurated by Rashmi Singh IAS, Secretary, NDMC in the presence of Sangeeta Bahadur, Author Kaal Trilogy and Indian Ambassador to Belarus, Dilip Pandey, Author & Member, Sahitya Kala Parishad, Bharati Bhargava, Founder Director of Delhi Literature Festival along with Rama Pandey known TV & Theatre personality.

The Festival started in the afternoon by a live performance of Charag-e-Harf by the Writer’s hub from Lucknow, followed by the session on Your Prime Minister is Dead (Vitasta Publishing)  by author Anuj Dhar followed by the next session onPadmavat- An Epic Love Story (Rupa Publications) by Purushottam Agarwal in conversation with Dr.Babli Moitra Saraf.

The evening session was on the popular book Bihar Diaries(Penguin Random House) by Amit Lodha IPS in conversation with Parull Mahaajan Advisor Delhi Literature Festival, followed by A Tribute to late Amrita Pritam- with panel discussion with Lavleen Thadani renowned Film & Theatre Personality, Laxmi Shankar Bajpai, Eminent Poet along with Sumit Mishra, Eminent Poet. The Session was presented by Palka Grover, Advisor Delhi Literature Festival.

The Second day of the Festival started with the Art of Story Telling with Victor Ghose, Indian writer in the historical fiction genre as well as in the paranormal short story genre, most notably the Eric Roy stories: The Job Charnock Riddle in 2016 and the Tomb of God (to be published in 2019) along with live performance on guitar followed by a Session on Hindi literature with acclaimed Hindi writers & poets including Maitreyi Pushpa, Anamika, Alpana Mishra in conversation with Prem Bhardwaj, Editor, Paaki Magazine at Delhi Literature Festival was quite interesting. As they all were discussing the importance of Hindi Literature

The evening session was full of Masala with Jonathan Gil Harris- Author of Masala Shakespeare (Rupa Publications) with Dr. Amna Mirza. Followed by a session on When History Meets Mystery- writing the Indian Historical Crime Fiction; Kaalkoot- The Lost Himalayan Secret (Treesahde Books) by S Venkatesh in conversation with Lipika Bhushan. The next session was on Infinite Variety, A History of Desire in India(Speaking Tree) by Madhavi Menon in conversation with Pallavi Rebbapragada, Author at First Post.

The last session on Day two was “Kama- The Riddle of Desire” (Penguin Randomhouse) by Gurcharan Das in conversation with Rachna Sharma.

The third and concluding day of the Festival started with Sufiana Mushaira curated by Mridula Tandon, Sakshi NGO along with Shayar Azhar Iqbal, Taruna Mishra, TarkashPradip, Irfan Khan Sikandar, Meenakshi, Jijivisha and ZeeshanNiazi. Followed by the next session on Early Indians: The Story of Our Ancestors and Where We Came From (Juggernaut) by Tony Joseph in conversation with Dr.AmnaMirza. The next session was on Lanterns and Fireflies by young first time Author Ritika followed by another session on A book of poems written in Hindi “Mann Tumahre Pass Hai” by Nitin Pramod in conversation with Parull Mahaajan Advisor Delhi Literature Festival. Each poem of this book is different in nature. Nature is an integral part of his poems.

With the General Elections round the corner, in the evening the Festival, witnessed interactive session on topical subjects including the book “The Contenders- Who will lead India Tomorrow”(Simon and Schuster) by Priya Sahgal.

The next Session on Mehr (Rupa Publications) by Sidhharth Gigoo in conversation with Samriddhi Goyal was quite engrossing and intense.

And the Concluding Session of this year’s Festival on Ayodhya: City of Faith, City of Discord (Aleph Book Company) by Valay Singh in conversation with Anup Sharma, Columnist &Storyteller.

The Delhi Literature Festival organisers acknowledged the support of the Delhi Government, Department of Art, Culture & Languages, NDSWA, URJA and the Delhi Book Lovers amongst others.