MUMBAI: India is a salad bowl of multiple identities, shared experiences and cultural exchanges spread over centuries encapsulated in the famed Ganga-Jamuni Tehzeeb (composite culture).
Now In Sync, a forum for interfaith arts and dialogue, is celebrating this diversity and syncretism through a three-day (June 2-4) event featuring visual arts exhibition, interfaith dialogues, dance performances, poetry and music recitals, panel discussions and expert talks at St. Andrew’s Centre for Philosophy and Performing Arts in Bandra West.
Conceptualised and curated by interfaith scholar Urmi Chanda and backed by a couple of entities, including Mahim Dargah Trust and World Interfaith Harmony and Unity Mission (WIHUM), the event creates spaces and opportunities for common citizens to come together to celebrate not just the syncretic legacy but also engage in interfaith dialogue.
“Through this forum, I hope to create a paradigm of social cohesion by employing the healing potentials of art and dialogue,” said Chanda who has spent the last four years formulating this model of interfaith engagement. “In these difficult times when divisions among people are being created in so many ways, such events help narrow the cleavages and cement our bonds,” said Saohail Khandwani, Mahim Dargah’s managing trustee and founding member of WIHUM.
Sanjukta Wagh, who will present ‘Nazaakat’, a celebration of Ganga-Jamuni Tehzeeb in kathak and poetic verse, hailed it as “a great effort to showcase the very spirit of multi-cultural India.” “I first talk about the poetic verses, say, kalam of Amir Khusrau or invocation to Shiva, and then present it through dance. It is very significant today when some people stress on differences rather than so much commonalities among us,” said Wagh. “Creating a space which encourages interfaith dialogue through arts is a brilliant concept,” said historian-author Rana Safvi.