Rediscovering Onam

Rediscovering Onam

Hariprasad Varma September 1, 2020

Onam festival is a quintessential part of the identity of Keralites. Onam is truly an all-inclusive festival that is celebrated across caste-religious divides in Kerala. However, the understanding of the origins of Onam festival and the central figures in its legend Vāmana and Mahabali seems to have undergone many distortions to the extent that most Malayalis who celebrate the festival today do not know of many of its significant aspects. It came as a shock to me few years back when I did some reading on this festival, and realised how little I knew of this most important event in Kerala. And so began my attempt to rediscover Onam for myself.

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Viva La Revolucion!

Hariprasad Varma December 25, 2019

Standing in a queue, I could easily recognise the angry, young activists in front. Back from an evening of protest marches, on the move to the next location to join the comrades in another city to make this a memorable

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How Would You Make A 10 Year Career Plan?

Hariprasad Varma December 11, 2018

I woke up today morning to this question from Adam Grant, the celebrated organisational psychologist at Wharton Business School, on my LinkedIn newsfeed. And the short answer to the question is, “Don’t bother about it.” Grant gives two reasons for

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Demonitisation And The Common Man

Hariprasad Varma November 12, 2016

Yesterday night I was traveling from Bangalore to Kolwan, a village about two hours away from Pune, to teach yoga for a group. It was a tense situation as I had ran out cash and had a single Rs.2000 note

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Bhima – A Review

Hariprasad Varma July 29, 2016

An absolutely brilliant performance by Vivek Vijayakumaran as Bhima! The play explored the complex character of Bhima from Mahabharata through the medium of Kutiattam.

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TEDxHyd 2015 – Unfolding Journeys

Hariprasad Varma September 25, 2015

Attending ‎TEDxHyderabad 2015 was an incredibly inspiring experience. If spending a day listening to change agents from different walks of life was inspiring in itself, being surrounded a budding community of thinkers, enablers and doers was the icing on the cake. The theme of the conference was ‘Unfolding Journeys’.

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