Inequality to the Amber Fort

Amber fort reflected in the lake 

Full moon over the Fort

Performance in the Fort

The first panel today featured Thomas Piketty the author of Capital. This book has sparked a worldwide debate about Inequality and Growth. He is an absolutely brilliant and self-assured French economist. It was a pleasure to listen to him, riff on all sorts of issues. His research is entirely data driven as he applies historical trends to what is happening today. He castigated the Indian Government for not being transparent about taxation and income. There is a lot of “Black Money” in India, that is money that is not reported to the government. Without appropriate taxes, investments in education, welfare and infrastructure can not be made. These investments lead to insure the growth of the economy. Raising inequality often leads to violence and must be addressed. I never thought I would be motivated to read a book about economics, but after the lecture I think I will obtain it. One interesting thing that Thomas brought out is that Capital is a world wide publishing phenomenon. It has sold 2.2 million copies. But the significant fact is that only 25% of the books are in English. The rest are in other languages. This indicates the issues of inequality are world-wide. It was a great lecture.

We then attended a panel entitled “Why Ancients Matter”. The panelist who all studied ancient cultures believe that it is important to understand where we came from as a civilization and to realize that we are not the pinnacle of human development. I found this panel too abstract for me to truly enjoy.

Ronnie Screwvala, is an Indian businessman who owns media companies. He has a new book out on how to become a success at business. Why do I feel those that buy the book won’t become the next Steve Jobs? At any rate, he is a dynamic speaker and obviously has thought of how to succeed in the business world. I am just not sure that you can learn it from a book.

The next session, was one of the very best I have experienced at the Literary Festival. It was a talk by Atul Gawande entitled: Being Mortal. Atul Gawande is a surgeon and a writer for The New Yorker. I remember when I saw an excerpt in The New Yorker and said to my self: That is one I won’t read. Then the book came out to much acclaim. I said to myself that is a book I won’t buy. Well here I was sitting with Cathy on the lawn in the first row in front of the stage as he spoke. Bottom line: We are all going to die, because of the advancement of medicine in the last 100 years, an increasing percentage of us will become aged and feeble. How are we going to live those years with diminished capacity for our own care? If we are terminally ill, how long, and what kind of life sustaining treatments do we desire? All of these questions and many more were discussed in the lecture and in the book. Atul used many examples from both his family and his medical practice to illuminate the issues. This is a difficult subject to contemplate and discuss and he had a very large audience rapt attention as he spoke of these issues. I guess I will have to read the book.

The next session was on Coming Out. It featured 3 gay writers discussing the process of coming out. The authors were Armistead Maupin who wrote the San Francisco based Tales of the City, Colm Toibin writer of the book Brooklyn which the Academy Award nominated movie is based upon an Indian writer and gay activist R. Raj Rao. Two of the authors live in western countries where homosexuality is accepted, one in India - where it is very difficult to come out. Because of the legislation 377 which makes gay sex illegal in India, and even creates problems for movie makers and authors to get works published, the Indian writer thinks people have to think long and hard before they come out. It was interesting, but understandable position. It will take time for gay rights to happen in India.

We sat through portions of two other lectures then called it a day. It was the best day yet. The festival expects over 300,000 visitors over the 5 days. This being Saturday it was chocked full of students who had the weekend off from school.

Vijay then drove the three of us (John joined us) up to the magnificent Amber Fort, which is perched on a mountain overlooking the city. It beautifully illuminated and is the epitome of what you would consider a Rajasthan fort. We went to attend a reading of several short plays followed by Sufi music. The Chief Minister was in attendance and security was extremely tight with armed guards with machine guns patrolling everywhere. The performance was held outside with in the fort, there was a full moon gazing down. It was a very special (and cold) evening we enjoyed the music wrapped in our shawls.

Here is brief video of the Sufi Music click to play.

We returned to Rambagh Palace after 11pm for a very late dinner (it lasted till way after midnight) and then to bed.

Tomorrow is another day at the JLF.