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Ichhapatra
₹200.00Ichapatra is a collection of five short stories by eminent Odia poet, playwright, essayist and fiction writer Jagannath Prasad Das. Stories are – Ichhapatra, Eka Eka, Kushilaba, Bhabamurti and Janmadata.
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Ichhapatra
₹200.00Ichapatra is a collection of five short stories by eminent Odia poet, playwright, essayist and fiction writer Jagannath Prasad Das. Stories are – Ichhapatra, Eka Eka, Kushilaba, Bhabamurti and Janmadata.
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Iconic Figures of Modern Odisha
₹600.00Odisha has a rich cultural heritage. The present volume is a collection of articles about thirty four legendary icons of modern Odisha by reputed scholars. It attempts to showcase the contributions of the seminal figures of the state of Odisha who have excelled in various fields like Politics, History, Economics, Philosophy, Psychology, Sanskrit, Sociology, Social Services, Sports, Art, Music, Spiritualism, Language and Literature etc. These towering personalities have earned reputations across the globe. This is a unique approach to highlight their contributions to understand various aspects of Odishan culture.
Iconic figures include Droupadi Murmu, Biju Patnaik, Nandini Satpathy, Harekrushna Mahatab, Janaki Ballav Patnaik, Naveen Patnaik, Biswabhushan Harichandan, Radhanath Rath, Chittaranjan Das, Manoj Das, Jayanta Mahapatra, Kunja Bihari Dash, Golok Bihari Dhal, Abhiram Paramahansha, Paramahansha Prajnanananda, Bhikari Bal, Ganeswar Mishra, Hrudananda Ray, J.N. Mohanty, Radhanath Rath (psychogy), Manmath Das, Jagannath Patnaik, Harekrishna Satpathy, Subrato Bagchi, Sudarshan Patnaik, Bhairab Mohanty, Sreeram Chandra Dash, Baidyanath Mishra, Achyuta Samanta, Pratibha Ray, Gopinath Mohanty and Dillip Tirkey.
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If Memory Could Speak
₹350.00This work has been presented in five chapters. Chapter-I (The place I come from) gives a brief account of the village the author has come from, its beautiful features, the caste structure in the village, inter caste relationship, land ownership etc. A brief attempt has been made here to throw some light on the state of the village and its level of development. In discussing an ordinary oil seller and his method of measurement, an attempt has been made to throw light on the socioeconomic position of the village and its people. It includes the picture of the rural elite who helped resolution of conflicts. The chapter-II (the author, his friends and family) is devoted to description of his parents, family, relations etc. This is a short one. Chapter III is on his professional career. The author has worked in Utkal, Berhampur, Sambalpur and Fakir Mohan Universities.
The two chapters (IV and V) relate to his days and activities in Fakir Mohan University. The chapter IV (F. M. University: Efforts for recognition) gives details about the way a university could be established at Balasore. It was at the nascent stage, and I had to bring it to a productive institution, various things were to be done, cooperation and help from several persons had to be sought and achieved. The university had to fulfil the conditions necessary for accordance of UGC recognition u/s 12(B) of the UGC Act, 1956. The university had to work like a university and function as such before the UGC Committee visited for grant of recognition. The Chapter-V (Post recognition developments) gives information about how the university prepared development projects for financing by the UGC and other funding agencies. And how the funds so received were fruitfully utilized in time. Also, in this chapter, the author has described how the new campus was built and how the university had to fight evil forces who created various types of difficulties. This chapter also includes author’s post retirement days.
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Illustrious Daughters of the Land: Timeless Stories of Struggle, Resilience and Inspiration
₹850.00This book pays tribute to the lives, voices, and legacies of Indian women-women who have walked diverse paths, often uncelebrated and relegated to the margins of history. Drawn from the rich and intricate shades of India’s cultural, historical, and social landscape, these stories highlight the strength, spirit, remarkable resilience and silent struggles of women who have, in countless ways, shaped the nation’s destiny.
Over three years, the author undertook a fascinating journey through archives, literature, oral histories, and regional narratives to rediscover and reimagine these women’s stories. Some of them were leaders and reformers, some artists, and thinkers, while many were ordinary women leading extraordinary lives in the quiet corners of homes and communities. From myths to modernity, and the pages of history to the margins of memory, these women are brought vividly to life through thoughtful interpretation and literary reflection.
This work is not merely a collection of biographies; it is a meditation on Indian womanhood. It explores the duties, responsibilities, dreams, and sacrifices that have defined and shaped women’s lives in India throughout the ages. It captures their enduring quest for dignity, respect, and equality in a patriarchal world, as well as the many ways they have resisted, redefined, and triumphed over adversity.
In each story, one finds a spark of courage, intellect, compassion, and rebellion. Together, these sparks from a luminous flame that continues to illuminate the path generations to come would follow. The book invites readers to remember, reflect on, and honour the countless Indian women, whose stories deserve to be told, celebrated, and passed on.
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In Between
₹150.00About the book:
When one reads poems written by a young person, one ordinarily expects them to express the joys and sorrows of growing up, and hopes and aspirations animating a young mind dreaming of and dreading the future. One also expects to share the anxieties oppressing the heart of someone who has not had the benefit of age and experience. However, a pleasant surprise awaited me when I started going through poems written by Sumedha put together in this collection. They reveal a whole new world of possibilities and a sensibility shaped by sober reflections on life and its many ironies. They are infused with a quiet intensity and convey a melancholy awareness of a world facing an unanticipated calamity. No wonder, the young poet feels the ‘weight of the world ‘ on her shoulders. The reader quickly moves away from the external world encompassing the poet towards an interior landscape presented evocatively but without sentimentality or self-indulgence. During this journey, questions arising in her mind lead her to explore impenetrable mysteries of life to which easy answers can never be found. Who can, for instance, answer the question, ‘Does the light stop where the dark begins?’ or ‘Does the light cast its own shadow?’. But the questions and a restless search for answers to them lend the poem depth, complexity and a resonant beauty.
I am confident that, as she grows older and finds new ways of experiencing and interpreting the world, Sumedha will find a distinctive voice which will render her poems more memorable and more richly meaningful.
Jatindra Kumar Nayak
Former Professor of English, Utkal University, Odisha
Professor Emeritus, KISS Deemed to be University, Odisha
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In Between Blooms
₹220.00Change, they say, is the only constant.
Change is what keeps the stone rolling so it gathers no moss – unstoppable and unfeeling as the wheels of time. But sometimes I wonder. Does beauty not lie in decay as well? Is stillness not a requisite for serenity?
In the casual delirium of our lives, we wander as Bedouins beneath a desert moon. Across dunes of daily experiences. Through sandstorms of difficult choices. All the while hurtling towards new destinations and newer identities as we continue to explore the world both without and within. And often we are so worn out from this journey that at the end of the day we forget the myriad paths that we have trodden.
In our relentless pursuit of the what and the where, we tend to overlook the how and the why.
Thus, once in a while, we need to take a back seat. And observe. Perceive and relish the wonders hiding in plain sight just around us – the high-pitched squeals of a child’s innocent laughter, the sizzle of stir-frying curry leaves, the blissful aroma of incense, city-lights sprouting at twilight…Innumerable instances of delicate charm that are omnipresent, but are rewarded only to keen senses, just as renowned philosopher Henry David Thoreau once rightly said – “It’s not what you look at that matters, it’s what you see.”
And yet, the art of observation doesn’t simply end with the discovery of earthly delights. At times when the tides of misery rise too high and the shores of solace seem too far, one has to still the mind in order to soothe the heart. For one who only stares skyward is blinded, whereas one who learns to gaze inward is enlightened.
It is these unnoticed details in the intricate tapestry of human existence that I wish to carve out and celebrate in this book. To savour each of its flavours and help spread its fragrance to others. To bring home the realization that a tree without flowers can still be elegant in its own right.
Nature, the sower of life and also its reaper, is never inert. Before the bees begin to bumble, a lot is happening behind the garb of apparent dormancy. So what if the buds haven’t bloomed? After all, the metamorphosis from caterpillar to butterfly is an affair of great ambition and precision. And such affairs take time.
Upon reflection, don’t we humans do the same? We bloom, we wither, and we bloom again and again till the ultimate withering sends us back to the earth we arose from. Now that, I believe, is the true essence of the human spirit – to brave all odds and never stop growing so that one day the frost shall thaw and spring shall unfurl.
If we are patient enough, gentle reader, perhaps we might understand this enigma that is life – daunting in its grandeur, humbling in its fragility, and in the wise words of Emily Dickinson, “fulfilling absolute decree in casual simplicity.”
And what better way to appreciate this than to cherish the sweet wait in between blooms! – Amlaan Akshayanshu Sahoo
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In Our Own Voice: Poems by Odia Women Poets
₹300.00Odisha has enjoyed a symbiotic relationship with poetry and has had a long and unbroken tradition of women writing poetry. Women have made significant contribution to the canon of Odia poetry, starting from the fifteenth century to the present. Among women poets of Odisha, perhaps the earliest is Madhabi Dasi, an exponent of Bhakti poetry and a contemporary of Sri Chaitanya. She wrote in Brajboli, Bangla and Odia. Her janāna “Chakānayan he Jagujiban Srihari” was one of her most popular devotional songs in Odia. Nandabai Chautiśā is another well-known poem composed by a woman from Odisha in pre-colonial times. Several women, mostly from royal families, composed devotional songs and long narrative poems in
the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Odisha witnessed a burst of feminine creative energy in the wake of Indian Independence which continued
undiminished through the last quarter of the century and has reached a fruition in the present, when writing poetry has become almost de rigeur, where poetry reading sessions and publication have become a state-wide quotidian activity. In Our Own Voice: Poems by Odia Women Poets is an ambitious
enterprise of the renowned poet, writer and playwright J. P. Das who has painstakingly culled, collected, and translated the creative outpourings of some of these women set far apart in time but geographically rooted in the state. Some of these poems were edited and translated by Das earlier
and appeared in two separate anthologies, titled In Other Words (2017) and Under the Silent Sun (1992). He co-edited the latter with the Chicago-based academician Arlene Zide. The present volume contains poems from these collections as well as many other young and vibrant voices. Originally written in Odia language and meticulously translated into English by Das, these poems belong to women writers spanning nearly half a century, who come from diverse walks of life. Some of them are working professionals who hail from the world of corporate and journalism; some are
fulltime writers while there are contributions from others who seem to steal time to compose verses in the interstices of their domestic chores.
The poems in this volume are rich and eclectic, which range over a variety of subjects, providing a polyphony of voices and a panoply of themes. The writers in this collection straddle different worlds-a little more than five decades separate Banaja Devi and Amiyabala Muni who were born
in pre-independent India circa 1941, from the youngest contributors, Tanmayee Rath and Swapnajita Sankhua, born during the pre-reform and post-liberalisation period of India, in the years 1987 and 1998 respectively. Poems collected from such a broad time spectrum would naturally
bring an array of thematic concerns and preoccupations. A brief overview of the development of Odia poetry by women over the decades since India’s Independence would reveal that, like all women’s poetry elsewhere in the world, there is a sense of thwarted aspiration and patriarchal oppression
in the early set of poets, sometimes coupled with the mildest influence of western modernism, resulting in occasional experimentation.
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In-Between
₹300.00‘In-Between’ is a story that unveils the inherent truth within every human being across different eras, a truth suppressed in the mental fabric of civilized societies. While individuals in any epoch may be considered modern within their temporal context, it is only the passage of time that categorizes them as traditionalists, conservatives, or unconventional. Drawing from the Indian knowledge tradition, the play aligns with the concept that, after completing the initial two stages of life, individuals enter an intermediate phase where they cannot revert to the past nor fully embrace the future. In contemporary times, this juncture typically manifests after the age of 40 or somewhere between the ages of 40 and 50.During this phase, a person finds himself in a unique situation – neither entirely old nor entirely young. Despite having youthful enthusiasm, arrogance, mischief, and numerous strenuous efforts, time comes on the way of life with many punctuation marks. While responsibilities take root in the mind, with its baggage, maturity begins to desire the transformation of baked, half-baked and unbaked emotions through the crucible of experience. It’s a peculiar juncture where children evolve into young individuals, driven by their emerging interests, while middle-aged individuals find their interests deeply embedded in their minds, exerting control over their lives. This marks the transitional period, perhaps a phase that renders a person vulnerable even when physical strength persists. Individuals with jobs encounter heightened challenges. As one navigates through the complexities of life, a multitude of experiences surfaces, leading to an overwhelming workload that extends from the office into the home, blurring boundaries. This brings individuals to a crossroads where they neither fully embrace a domestic lifestyle nor remain solely dedicated to their professional roles. In this scenario, equilibrium becomes disrupted, sparking conflicts between spouses. Coping with such challenges demands a unique skill set that may not be possessed by everyone. Natural skill to deal with such situations are not found in everyone as nature distributes its gifts unevenly, and relying on fate for mercy is ultimately futile. Women face more profound challenges compared to men. Given the revered role of mothers across cultures, their focus tends to lean towards their children rather than their husbands. The existence of a generation gap among spouses and children leads to divergent ideologies. Within this dynamic, a woman, referred to as a mother, finds herself navigating conflicting loyalties. Struggling to decide between her children and husband, her heart remains with the former while her mind remains with the latter. Remarkably, she manages to maintain a more delicate balance than men. Despite a deeper affection for her children, she retains her commitment to her husband. Men can learn valuable lessons in this balancing act from women.This play delves into a crucial theme cantered around human values that get trampled between the destructive forces of false pride and ego. The negative influences of position-related arrogance, male-centric pride, and unchecked greed can degrade an individual to the point where they lose awareness of their responsibilities and disregard the rights of others. By the time the completely ruined individual realises and acknowledges the unfairness of their actions, the clock signals the end of their time.It is expected that this work effectively conveys the significance of the pure Indian philosophy encapsulated in Sarve Bhavantu Sukhinah and resonates with discerning readers.
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Incredible Odisha: Celebrating the Rhythms and Traditions of Odisha
₹350.00Through this book, Incredible Odisha, meticulously prepared by Dr. Sonali Sahu, an effective teacher in English and an efficient scholar with in-depth knowledge on cultural nuances, we invite readers to explore these traditions not as isolated performances but as living legacies tied to the land, the festivals, the faiths, and the everyday lives of its people. Each dance form is a mirror to the region’s history, its resilience, and its connection to the divine and the communal.
We owe a deep debt of gratitude to the artists, gurus, scholars, and communities who continue to breathe life into these traditions. It is their passion and perseverance that have inspired this book. May this work serve as a step toward preserving, documenting, and celebrating the diverse dance heritage of Odisha.
Let us move together to the rhythm of Incredible Odisha.
Prof. Basanta Kumar Panda
Project Director
Centre of Excellence for Classical Odia
Ministry of Education
Govt. of India
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India for the World
₹300.00“Seeing the World” famed Dr. Mahapatra has come up with his second collection of poems “India for the World”, continuing his old trend but much mellowed, smoothened and vibrant. He continues the same trend – from local to global- from his native village on the bank of Subarnarekha, close to the sea, close to the village of world-famous writer Manoj Das, to Odisha and then to India, and finally to the world. A globe trotter, rooted in his soil looks at the world at large. He continues the trend of great Indian English poets, Ezekiel, Ramanujan and Odisha’ s Jayant Mohapatra, Bibhu Padhi and Niranjan Mohanty with a difference. His poems are comprehensible, poems of ideas and intellect with a purpose to change the world. He looks at everything with an objective distance but gets agitated within which gives way to his poems, otherwise all his poems would have been great essays. A cursory look at the content page shows how the titles are in fact titles of essays, be it ‘Global Democracy’, ‘Human Ingenuity’, ‘Growth Evenly Balanced’, ‘World a Family’, ‘Convergence: India’s Mission’, or ‘Ponds Still Relevant’, ‘India for the World’ (the title of the collection). Is it possible, one wonders, to convert these prose themes into poems? Dr. Mahapatra has made possible the impossible. What made him possible, the impossible? His mastery over words, playing with words, that come to him like ‘leaves to trees’. One word flowing into another, then another to another, preceded by flow of ideas following ‘Stream of Consciousness’.
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Indian Parliament and Democratic Polity – Varied Musing
₹300.00This book is a compelling anthology of eleven essays by Ravindra Garimella, a seasoned parliamentary bureaucrat with over four decades of experience. It delves into the vibrant and multifaceted journey of Indian democracy, exploring topics that are pivotal to understanding the workings of the Indian Parliament and the country’s democratic ethos.
The essays span a broad range of subjects, from the history and symbolism of the Indian National Flag, constitutional values, to contemporary issues like marriage equality following the Supreme Court’s 2023 verdict. The book also sheds light on the inner workings of Parliament, such as procedural tools available to MPs, budgetary processes, and no-confidence motions, offering readers a deeper appreciation of parliamentary traditions and mechanisms.
The volume stands as a valuable resource for students, scholars, and anyone intrigued by the nuances of India’s democratic journey. With a foreword by Mallikarjun Kharge, Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha, this compilation is both a tribute to and a guide for understanding the enduring legacy and evolving dynamics of Indian democracy.
Through this collection, the author not only shares insights into parliamentary procedures and historical contexts but also engages with contemporary debates, making it a timely and thought-provoking addition to literature on Indian polity.
