Meet the speakers of TEDxImphal

E-pao.net *

In any TED talks or any TEDx event, it is the speakers who hold center stage. It is them who make the magic happen around such talks. Our E-Pao Team profiles the speakers and the train of their thoughts they will be sharing at TEDxImphal, which will unfold on December 11, 2011 at Hotel Classic.

According to the organizing team of TEDxImphal, when the plans for the event was taking shape about a year ago it was about who would speak at the event that took prime importance in all the discussions. "We wanted people who would inspire others through their experiences," says Devakishor. But it was not easy to compile a list of potential speakers.

Another organizer Paonam Thoibi added, "We set to think about people we normally don't get to hear much of. Yes, Manipur has no dearth of achievers in terms of award winning film-makers, sportspersons, artistes or doctors, engineers etc. We wanted to come up with people who were quietly doing the things they do best!"

Ironically, the first speaker to express his interest in the event was a non-Manipuri! Arijit Sen, the Senior Special Correspondent for CNN-IBN, covering the entire North east region approached the team saying he wanted to speak about bridging the gap between media and the people.

Arijit Sen Facebook Profile

Chitra Ahanthem, organizing team member says, "We decided to have Arjit Sen on board because his talk would focus on how local reporters/media people can get to the bottom of the story and how collaborations can remove the veil of silence on underreported regions, unknown lives, unknown conflict. In his synopsis of the talk, Arjit mentions about "Bridging the divides, teaming reports" as an idea of collaboration and verification that extends beyond citizen journalism and which can be the future of reporting."

Arijit Sen, it may be mentioned is an award-winning news documentary on extra-judicial 'fake' encounters in Manipur (September 2009). His reportage has received media recognition: most recently, the News Television Award for Best News Documentary (2010) and the Ramnath Goenka Award for Excellence in Journalism (2008-09). He is also a 2010-11, Gerda Henkel Fellow at Oxford University.

Swar Thounaojam (short for Swarnalata) a Bangalore-based playwright and theatre director stood out for team TEDxImphal because of what she was doing and where. Writing plays in English and feted with critical acclaim, Swarnalata as a speaker will present the diverse complexities of being a playwright, a woman and belonging to Manipur.

In her speech abstract titled 'Undesirable Thoughts In A Playwright's Mind' she says, "People want to hear my stories and I can easily tell them stories of the torture and death I grew up with; the torture and death my parents are still living in. I can offer stories of extreme human experience and represent the obscenity of it. But am I willing to produce these representations? How do I respond to the bipolar regime in Manipur? How do I work and write as a playwright whose worldview is shaped and challenged by Manipur? What is the true challenge?"

Swar Thounaojam

Swar Thounaojam's debut play 'Turel' was directed by Sunil Shanbag and premiered at Prithvi Theatre, Mumbai as part of the Writers Bloc Festival, 2007 – an India initiative of Royal Court Theatre, London in collaboration with Rage, Mumbai. Turel is also being translated into French for a festival on contemporary Indian playwriting to be held in France in 2012. Dear Dirty, Opposite Day, Fake Palindromes and Lucky Lobster are some of her plays.

A Charles Wallace India Trust awardee for the International Playwrights Residency, 2010, Royal Court Theatre, London and a recipient of Robert Bosch Art Grant 2010, Swar has worked extensively in Bangalore, Delhi, Mumbai and Munich and runs her own theatre project titled FewerEmergencies in Bangalore.

But the process of figuring who would speak at TEDxImphal was no easy task. According to Supriya Shijagurumayum, "We were all very keen to have more women speakers. The first person on the list was the person who will forever stay immortal because of her body of work: Chungkham Rani Devi whose weaving designs are known throughout the state and beyond as 'Wangkhei phi' and 'Rani phi'.

We wanted her to speak at the event because hers is a unique story of a young woman widowed at 27 years who went on to produce handloom designs like no one else has done." Unfortunately, the team in Imphal found that Chungkham Rani was not keeping well because of her age (79 yrs) and was not able to meet visitors, much less be able to speak.

Paonam Thoibi adds, "Some of our friends then suggested another name of a reed crafts artisan, a woman. Our team members went to meet her and saw her body of work. All of us were very sure that having her as a speaker would not only give her crafts products a huge reach but also inspire other people about the idea of being inspired. However, she pulled out saying she would not be able to speak in public."

Yet, there would be others who would write in to the organizing team expressing their interest in speaking at the event. "But we had this thumb rule: we would only feature people who had treaded unfamiliar paths and had something different to say," says Devakishor Soraisam.

Johnson Rajkumar

So when Johnson Rajkumar, a media activist working at Pedestrian Pictures, Bangalore and someone who been documenting social movement, political protests in Bangalore wrote in to say he was keen to feature at TEDxImphal, he was given the green signal. Supriya Shijagurumayum adds, "Johnson is looking at the premise of how to use media as a tool for people's movement and at the same time question the dominant voices.

According to him, the media should bring voices and perspectives that are either missing, under-represented or misrepresented in the mainstream media besides unearthing the politics and construct of corporate media itself and we thought listening to his experience and journey would be worthwhile."

* this is the first part on the speakers of TEDxImphal.