Nandita Das on ‘Feisty & Fearless’

The panelists on the virtual session on ‘Feisty and Fearless’, held as part of the Mysuru Literature Festival 2020, hosted by Mysuru Literary Forum and Charitable Trust and Mysuru Book Clubs - 2015, on the fifth day, on Saturday were actor Nandita Das and director Kavitha Lankesh.

The festival, virtual due to the Covid-19 crisis, the fourth edition since 2017, is being held on weekends from August 14 to September 5.

Nandita Das, an actor, director and activist, is known for her award-winning performances on the screen and also campaigns for social justice, gender equality and human rights. She entered Bollywood in 1996 with Deepa Mehta’s film ‘Fire’ with Shabana Azmi, as a co-actor.

Along with path-breaking films like ‘Earth’, ‘Fire’ and ‘Bawander’, she had a brief stint in mainstream films in ‘Aks’ with Amitabh Bachchan. Apart from acting, Nandita has done direction and writes her own scripts.

Her movies ‘Firaaq’ and ‘Manto’ have done well abroad. Nandita Das was a part of street theatre in Delhi. She has been a critic of colourism since long.

Kavitha Lankesh, a director and producer, is from a family of journalists and media publishers. Her father P Lankesh founded weekly tabloid ‘Lankesh Patrike’. She started her career as a corporate and documentary filmmaker and went on to make feature films.

Her films are ‘Deveeri’, ‘Tananam Tananam’, ‘Crazy Loka’ and ‘Preethi Prema Pranaya’. Some of her films have won international, national and state awards. Kavitha has written, scripted and directed 50 plus corporate films and documentaries and nine full-length feature films.