This year, the event has been given a COVID-19 theme, and renamed as Requiem for Justice. There are 44 artistes from 25 different countries who will perform sets that expose how the pandemic has laid bare the same sort of injustices in an even starker manner. The names include people as famous as Grammy-winning cellist Yo Yo Ma and others who haven't been afforded such a global reach before, such as Homayoun Sakhi from Afghanistan. Karwan e Mohabbat is an action-oriented cultural organisation that is flying the Indian flag at the programme, having roped in, among others, musicians TM Krishna and Mohit Chauhan for individual performances, poet Aamir Aziz for a reading, and author Arundhati Roy to deliver a special message. Natasha Badhwar, who heads Karwan's media team, shares that the programming also includes a short film titled Stranded that highlights societal inequalities. She tells us, "The experience that every country has had is not so much a case of the virus against the people as it is the state versus the people. So, what we are trying to bring out is the experience that different countries have had to the same stimulus."

TM Krishna

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Badhwar adds that Roy had the perfect metaphor for the pandemic. The writer compared it to an X-ray machine, pointing out how it has shown us what was already hidden inside. "It has exacerbated what already existed in terms of inequalities, the breakdown of the medical system and the lack of institutional help," Badhwar says. But will the powers that be learn from the difficulties faced during this period? One can only hope that the answer is yes.

Aamir Aziz

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