This story is from March 6, 2020

Mallika posts speech she was ‘not allowed to give’ at NID convocation

Mallika posts speech she was ‘not allowed to give’ at NID convocation
Ahmedabad: On Thursday evening, city-based danseuse and activist Mallika Sarabhai released on Facebook the speech she had prepared for the 40th convocation of National Institute of Design (NID) scheduled on February 7, which was later cancelled. On the cancellation of the convocation, Sarabhai wrote that she was not given a reason (for the same). ‘I have still not been contacted.
A convocation sans chief guest will take place on the 7th,’ she wrote in the post, adding that she’s posting the speech she was ‘not allowed to give.’
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The 300-plus students from Ahmedabad, Gandhinagar and Bengaluru campus were left in the lurch when the convocation was cancelled four days prior to the event. Internal communication suggested a re-scheduled event on March 7 but so far NID has not given out any official invites or put the event on their website or social media accounts.
In her speech, she pointed out that prior to her, only one woman – Kapila Vatsyayan – was the chief guest at the ceremony. She also expressed her early fascination with design, texture and textiles thanks to ‘Amma,’ her mother and celebrated danseuse Mrinalini. She also brushed upon her jewellery venture ‘Tamasha.’ She reminisced photo shoots with traditional Gujarati fare.
“We live in troubling times. Over the last few hundred years humans have come to believe that we are the centre of the universe and the universe exists to serve us… This system values the biggest as the best. It values brute force over compassion,” her speech stated.
In her speech, she also mentioned that our policies try to iron out our individualities, our quirks, our diversities, to enforce a oneness, a single-approved truth or way of life. ‘And in doing so shows the deep lack of self-worth that has become our corner stone,’ she mentioned, urging the students as ‘our only hope.’
In the conclusion, she urged the students to redefine their true selves. ‘Not a sense of self sold to us by brand ambassadors and pedlars of fear, but the self that will once again make India a nation to lead to a clearer light, of reason, compassion and humaneness, of inclusivity, of acceptance of difference,’ she wrote, concluding it with ‘Let us be the finders of light, for India and for a saner world.’
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