The second day of the International Conference

 The second day of the Third International Seminar on Empires and Kingdoms of Dakshinapatha, was equally interesting. Though we were there from nine thirty to seven in the evening, one never got boared for a second for the panels were very interesting. There was so much one learnt from Archeology, to  Numismatics, to Iconography, to Jewelry. It was great to know how much work on Telengana was  happening in France, in US and in Cambridge University in UK. The hight light of the Seminar were the two special lectures in the evening. The first was by Dr. Marcella Sirhandi who spoke about a painter Abdur Rahman Chughtai, who was invited by the Nizam to paint for him. When the partition took place he left for Lahore leaving behind more than one hundred water colour paintings, which were then distributed between Hyderabad, Mahboobnagar and Mysore. The paintings were really very beautiful and I clicked few of them. The next special lecture was  by Guru Kalakrishna, who has revived the Perini dance.  Though this dance was performed only by men before going to war asking for blessings of Shiva, there were references in Telugu literature about female performers. We hear about this dance form under Kakatiya rulers and then it disappears and was not performed.  Now he has revived it by looking at sculptures and literature of the period. We also saw the performance and it is very different from Bharatnatyam and Kuchipudi. Even the dress and jewelry of both men and women was copied from sculptures and I could identify this as having seen in some sculptures earlier. The female dance is very graceful with a lot of leg movements and the male dancers performance has  a lot of energy. The evening saw a performance of all these artists and I reached home only at ten at night. A wonderful seminar and I really appreciate the efforts made by the Director, Ms. N. R. Visalatchy, to make this department so filled with activities and also bring out reprints of many publications. She has made this seminar truly an interdisciplinary one and brought in so many scholars to a single platform. I am sure this is one of  the most vibrant among all  the Archeological departments through out the country and we in Telangana are very proud of this fact.

The third International Seminar on Empires and Kingdoms of Dakshinapstha

 The third International Seminar on Empires and Kingdoms of Dakshinapstha was organised by the Government of Telangana, Department of Heritage. Telangana is the first state in the country that has renamed its Department of Archeology and Museums as the Department of Heritage. This seminar brought scholars all around the world who have worked on Telangana history and culture.The beauty of the Seminar is that it is organised very professionally and the timings are adhered to. We, never felt the time moving so fast and from morning nine thirty to six thirty in the evenings for a, lot of interesting papers were packed in different panels. One learnt so much about the kind of work happening on Telangana in different parts of the world. It was very nice to meet many old friends.

Receiving Nidhi at the airport and meeting Salilan old student

 Happiness is when you go to receive your daughter in law at the airport on 17th January, 2019 and meet an old student of yours and standing there, chalk out a joint program to be organised in the University soon. Thanks Salil Kader.

Meeting Anjali Hazarika

 The Centre for Innovations in Public systems organised a very interactive session with Anjali Hazarika, the author of the book, Walk the talk:women work, equity and effectiveness on 11th january, 2019. I attended along with two of my research scholars Pooja and Pabitra. A lovely discussion on women at the workplace, Gender issues, mindsets, etc. followed. It was nice to meet many old friends like Lakshmi Lingam from TISS, Ram Laxmi, Hari Priya from IIT and Jammela Nishat. Also interacted with Prof. Nirmala Apsingikar the Director of Administrative Staff College of India(ASCI). Thanks Shri. Achalender Reddy, the Director of Centre for Innovations in Public Systems for inviting me. I am glad that you have recognised Gender issues to be an important issue to be addressed. After this we went to Secunderabad and had a very important meeting with  Save the Children General Manager, Vikas Gora and got an understanding  about their work with the refugees In Hyderabad.

Meeting Jeevanandam and Archana, My Old students

 It is always a great sense of achievement and fulfillment to connect with our past students. I was very happy to see S. Jeevanandam Sankar and his wife Archana who were both  my Ph. D students in the past, come and meet me in Hyderabadon 9th January, 2019. Jeeva was my M. Phil and Ph. D student and Archana also did her  Ph. D with me. Jeevanandam is  now  a faculty in the University of Sikkim and is doing well and is very serious about his work. In fact he is now offering a large number of courses on Women's History and carrying forward this work in North East along with other students of mine. Jeeva and Archana Sivaprakashan now have a son and I was teasing them that he will soon be my friend on Facebook. I still remember that another students of mine Lavanya  and Naga Sridhar   had come home  with a almost new born baby and now both the children have grown up as very smart teenagers and are my friends on Face book. Jeeva's son took to Suresh in a big way and refused to leave him when he had to leave.  It was indeed great to have both Jeeva and Archana at the Centre and at home. They spoke in such nostalgic terms about our University and how they miss it. It is great to know that our University has this kind of a nostalgia for students. I had met a couple from Iran who had now settled in  New Zealand  and who had passed out in early 2000 and spoke a similar language about our University. I had never taught them or knew them but they invited me to their house in New Zealand, when they came to know that I am from University of Hyderabad. I had a similar experience in Taipai long time back in the  nineties when a student from Chemistry Department whom I met casually in the bus came and picked me from the hotel and took me home for dinner and introduced me to his wife.

An evening with Dr. K.K. Muhammad

 On the 4th of january, 2019, evening, I had a  visitor Dr. K. K. Muhammad come home along with my Colleague, Dr. Rajesh and Dr. Moirathem Singh from MIT, Arunachal Pradesh along with my students Karan Palsaniya and Rizwan Ahmad. It was a great evening  and I am indebted to Dr. Muhammad that though he wad very tired and had travelled all the way from Gulburga and reached Hyderabad only around 7.30,and had to leave next morning at 4.00to catch an early flight and was literally very tired, he made time to meet me. I really respect Dr. Muhammad a  lot being familiar with his work, his excavations and his scholarship. Suresh Pande also follows him very seriously and has seen all his videos many of which I have not seen. Dr. Muhammad is a person whom I admire for he does not fall under any category but looks at the facts and interprets history. He is neither a leftist historian, nor a rightist historian but a liberal one with a keen interest in the past and attempting to interpret it based on the evidence. He informed me that when I was doing my Ph. D and had gone to Aligarh Muslim University for my Library work, he was the one who had accompanied me to meet Dr. K. A. Nizami. That meeting is so fresh in my mind though it must have been some where in 1978 or 1979. I was just an ordinary student doing my Ph. D. but I still remember Dr. Nizami gave me so much time and had a long discussion with me. He served me tea or coffee, I forget what  now but with fantastic cake and other eatables. I was a nobody then, but this meeting is always fresh in my mind as to how I was treated and I tried to follow this in my own life. I think it was Dr. Abul Kalam who had said,though I do not recollect the exact words that  after many years you will forget, what  people  said or what you  learnt  but you will never forget  how they made you feel. This is so true and that is exactly what I remember about Dr. Nizami. I had a similar experience with Ishwari Prasad, C. P. Tripathi, R. P Tripathi, Firaq Gorakhpuri, Gopesh ji  and many more in Allahabad. Dr. Muhammad was the Regional Archeological Director of the Archeological Survey of India and continues to be involved with the Agha Khan Trust as its Project Archeological   Director. He has stood his ground and on the Archeological discoveries and their interpretation even in the Ayodhya temple region and is not influenced by any isms. His Malyalam autobiography is called, I  an Indian. I have not read it and forgot to ask if it is translated into English. I will soon catch up with him when I visit Calicut which is his home.