Lopamudra Column

The Bali Jatra (also known as Voyage to Bali and Bōita Bandāṇa),a famous annual festival in the Eastern Indian state of Odisha, celebrates ancient cross-cultural social and trade connections with South and South-East Asia. The festival is held in the city of Cuttack at Gadagadia Ghat on the Mahanadi river, to mark the day when the Sadhabas (ancient Oriya mariners)...

The railways came to Sri Lanka about twelve years after it they did in neighboring India. The beginning was rough with many odds stacked against the project. But with the help of a Briton, W F Faviell, who had previously built a railway in India, railway construction got underway in the island colony in right earnest.

By Dr.Lopamudra Maitra Bajapai Colombo, April 3 (newsin.asia): It was the French classic adventure novelist Jules Verne, who in his acclaimed novel Le tour du monde en quatre-vingts jours (Around the World in Eighty Days) proposed the idea of technology connecting vast stretches of the world in the 19th century. He said through a discussion with the main protagonist, Phileas...

By Dr.Lopamudra Maitra Bajpai A cherished exhibit on shelves in gift shops in Sri Lanka is the country’s indigenous wooden doll. There are made of single scraps of wood with the limbs painted on the torso. The head is moulded into a smooth round top on which the details of the face, the head-gear, hair, beard and moustache and bun...

By Dr.Lopamudra Maitra Bajpai Chewing “bulath” or betel leaves is an ancient tradition across South and South-east Asia and also some parts of the Pacific. And with the practice of chewing betel leaves came the designing of betel containers or bulath bags. Over time, from ancient times, the use of betel leaves became ritualized. It got incorporated into religious systems....

By Dr. Lopamudra Maitra Bajpai/newsin.asia Ruins or remains of material culture in urban areas help us reconstruct important historical episodes. Telegraph and electricity ruins across the British colonies are a witness to the gradual evolution of the system of communication. Roads built or renovated across colonial Ceylon also have fascinating stories to tell. Thus, a close study of the many...

By Dr.Lopamudra Maitra Bajpai/newsin.asia Through time, Indian villages have been counted as an important area of interaction. Though the village of today differs from what it was a few centuries ago, it continues to be a repository of what is called the “Intangible Cultural Heritage”. In the 2003 conference of the UNESCO in Paris, a decision was taken to give...

By Dr. Lopamudra Maitra Bajpai/newsin.asia Many years ago, working in the Kolkata station of All India Radio, it was an interesting to find a special place being given to a tribal language called Santali. News and other programs were broadcast in this little known language. Programmes in Santali continue to this day and are popular along with broadcasts in Bengali,...

By Dr. Lopamudra Maitra Bajpai Court jesters in South Asian history were not “jokers” nor were they mere entertainers who lightened the stiff and ritualistic atmosphere in the courts of Asiatic potentates. Their sharp wit and pithy remarks were invariably backed by wisdom which was often used by the monarchs to good effect, sometimes even to get out of sticky...