The All-Russian State Library for Foreign Literature, named after M.I. Rudomino, hosted a teleconference between Russia and India, which was dedicated to the 225th anniversary of Aleksander Pushkin’s birth.

The theme of the teleconference was “Reading is the best teaching. Reflections on Happiness.” The hosts were Tamara Skok, PhD in Philology, head of the “Modern Russian” international project, and Aleksandra Burman, Head of International Projects at TV BRICS.

Mikhail Antsiferov, Attache at the Russian Embassy in New Delhi, and Elena Remizova, Director of the Russian House in Mumbai, addressed the audience and emphasised the importance of such events for establishing stronger cultural and educational contacts between our countries.

During the teleconference, the foreign participants learned about the universal concept of happiness from Pushkin’s works and recited poems by the world-famous poet in Russian. They watched video sketches of the places where the Russian author lived and wrote: Mikhailovsky, Zakharovo, Bolshiye Vyazem, Prechistenka in Moscow, and others. The pictures of Pushkin’s ball were recreated for the broadcast.

“Pushkin is so multifaceted as a person and so profound as a poet and writer that addressing him himself, his fate, and his work has been giving food for thought to people in different countries for more than two centuries. We are grateful to our colleagues from India who made efforts to organise today’s teleconference and to the teachers and students of leading universities who prepared their speeches; they spoke about the phenomenon of happiness in Indian culture and recited Pushkin’s texts by heart. During the teleconference, we tried to ‘follow the thoughts of a great person’, relying on Pushkin’s artistic and epistolary texts. Observations on the search for the components of a happy and harmonious life allowed us to identify what our cultures have in common: a person is happy when he or she feels unity with nature, is loved, has a family, can do what he or she likes, is able to do good, and shares joy. These are the very ‘good feelings’ that Pushkin awakened with his work and that are understandable to people of different countries”

Тамара Скок Director of the Department of Innovative Linguistic Projects at TV BRICS

Aleksandra Burman, Head of International Projects at TV BRICS, recalled that the media network and the international project “Modern Russian” have been running a series of teleconferences between Russia and India for two years now to study the Russian language and get acquainted with Russian culture.

“One of the indicative criteria of the demand for our video meetings is the number of foreign participants, which is constantly growing. Thus, students and teachers from more than 20 universities located in 10 states of India joined the teleconference in honour of Aleksander Pushkin’s anniversary. Through careful preparatory work in selecting and creating materials, inviting respected experts to the dialogue, and active interaction with Indian colleagues, it was possible to create a comfortable educational space and provide conditions for a more emotional and deep immersion in the topic. This format was received with great enthusiasm by the Indian side”

Aleksandra Burman Head of International Projects at TV BRICS

Pavel Kuzmin, General Director of the Library for Foreign Literature, noted that reading literary works in different languages helps representatives of different cultures learn to understand each other.

“We would like to tell about the culture of the BRICS countries and to find the common, deep traditions and human relations that are common to all the inhabitants of the BRICS countries. BRICS is first and foremost a community of people who share similar values,” he added.

Professor Charanjit Singh, President of the Indian Association of Teachers of Russian Language and Literature, who moderated the teleconference online, expressed hope that the teleconference would help foreign students better understand the poet’s work.

“We hope that in this process, Pushkin’s genius and his ideas not only about happiness but also about life in general will be revealed,” he said.

Meenu Bhatnagar, Associate Professor, Centre of Russian Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, shared her impressions of the lecture by TV BRICS representatives.

“The teleconference dedicated to the 225th anniversary of Pushkin’s birth was a humble tribute to this great Russian poet who continues to instill a love for Russia and Russian language and literature not only in Russians but also in foreign students studying Russian.

The interactive lecture prepared by Tamara Skok and Aleksandra Burman gave us a deep understanding of how Pushkin expressed happiness in his poems. How, reading his poems, one can feel the author’s inner feelings, the depth of his Russian soul,” she said.

Previous Russia-India teleconferences were dedicated to international friendship, Russian hospitality, and Pancake Day celebrations. In 2022, the TV BRICS lecture “Peculiarities and Identity of Russian Regions” was held at Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi in a face-to-face format for undergraduate, graduate, and postgraduate students of the Department of Russian Studies. In 2023, the media network was an information partner of the international volunteer programme of the Pushkin State Russian Language Institute, “Russian Language Ambassadors in the World,” which included an expedition to India.

The international information and awareness-raising project “Modern Russian” was created in 2007 to popularise the Russian language, improve the literacy level of the population, and provide linguistic assistance. It is implemented by the international network TV BRICS. It has no analogues in Russia or abroad in terms of a set of practical philological activities. Information resources and consulting services for the project are used in more than 150 countries around the world. “Modern Russian” is the winner of the All-Russian contest of intellectual projects “Derzhava” and the All-Russian contest of PR projects on preserving and strengthening the Russian language in the Russian Federation. It cooperates with the Pushkin State Russian Language Institute and the Russkiy Mir [Russian World] Foundation.

This teleconference between Russia and India was the fourth for TV BRICS, but this time it was the largest in terms of the number of participants: students and teachers from twenty higher education institutions from the states of Delhi, Gujarat, Kerala, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Telangana, West Bengal, Punjab, and Haryana joined the video meeting. 

These include the country’s largest institutions of higher learning: Aawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi, Delhi University, the English and Foreign Languages University near Tarnaka, Hyderabad, Maharaja Sayajirao University in Vadodara, and the and the University of Punjab in Chandigarh.

The teleconference was co-organised by the Association of Teachers of Russian Language and Literature. The broadcast was supported by the Russian House in New Delhi.

Photo: TV BRICS