Open Space Activities in December 2006

   FILM

PRESENTATION & DISCUSSION

Monday, December 1, 5.30pm onwards, at Open Space
To mark World Aids Day, Open Space/Centre for Communication and Development Studies and the Sahyog Trust, Pune invite you to a talk on the legal rights of people living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA) by advocate Asim Sarode and social worker Rama Sarode. The talk will focus on the constitutional rights of PLWHA to guarantee them protection against discrimination and stigmatisation. A representative of the Network of Maharashtra by People Living with HIV&AIDS ( NMP+) will present the legal problems faced by HIV positive people.

Certain cases being handled by the Sahyog Trust will be discussed by the presenters, followed by an interactive session.

The Sahyog Trust is a Pune based socio-legal advocacy initiative working on public interest campaigns relating to human rights issues. Through its Human Rights and Law Defenders group Sahyog plans to campaign for the rights of PLWHA across Maharashtra. Since people living with HIV/AIDS increasingly face a host of legal problems, Sahyog has started an HIV/AIDS Legal Support Initiative (HALSI) to offer them legal guidance.

CREATIVE WRITING WORKSHOP

Open Space, December 8 and 9, 2.00 – 6.00 pm, at Open Space
Open Space invites registrations for a 2-day creative writing workshop conducted by C P Surendran, poet and Editor, The Times Of India , Pune and poet and writer Vijay Nambisan.
The First Line: Writing the first line of a story/essay/poem so it draws the reader in and prepares the ground
Choosing your audience: Writing and adapting your language for your reader
The Writer & the World: Exploring the extent to which you should engage with the world

Sessions will be held from 2.00 – 6.00 pm on both days.

The poems, essays, short stories written by the participants will be featured on the Open Space website ( www.openspaceindia.org ).
To register, e-mail your resume to renu@openspaceindia.org and iyer_renu@rediffmail.com before December 1, 2006. Those selected will be informed via e-mail by December 5.

A fee of Rs 250/- will be payable at the venue at the beginning of the workshop.

 
 

Open Space, December 13, 6.00pm – 8.00pm, at Open Space
Open Space invites you to a screening of the documentary film, Yamuna Gently Weeps (Dir: Ruzbeh N Bharucha, 72 mins English), a story of one of the biggest and oldest slums in Delhi and India, called Yamuna Pushta.

A world within a world, this massive township of more than 40,000 homes which gave shelter to 1,50,000 people was demolished in a few weeks (which year?), leaving more than 1,20,000 people on the streets. In the guise of resettlement, just 20% of the families whose hones were raised were shunted 40 kms away from the main city onto a barren piece of land in Bawana, where there was no proper sanitation, meagre water supplies, no electricity, no healthcare facilities, and worst of all, no scope of earning a livelihood.

From the book ‘Yamuna Gently Weeps' by Ruzbeh N. Bharucha

The screening will be followed by a discussion.

Ruzbeh N Bharucha was born in 1967, in Mumbai, India. He completed his graduation from Jai Hind College, Mumbai, majoring in Economics. He began his writing career in his final year of college, editing and publishing a magazine called Venture .


FILM FESTIVAL

Open Space, December 20 - 24, 3.00pm – 7.00pm, Open Space invites you to ‘Other World's are Breathing 2005' , a five-day film festival on the political, economic, social and cultural alternatives to neo-liberal, capitalistic globalisation explored through the medium of films at the World Social Forum (WSF) 2005 in Porto Alegre, Brazil.

For detailed schedule click here >>