balaji@uscvax.UUCP (Balaji Narasimhan) (03/12/86)
Forwarded from KAPUR@ge-crd -------- From KAPUR@ge-crd.arpa Wed Mar 12 10:31:00 1986 -------- Dear friends: The response to my message on the mailing lists regarding the planning of Dr. Kothari's visit to North America has been very enthusiastic. This is an indication to us that inviting people such as Dr. Kothari to North America for lecture tours is likely to be well received. A friend of mine, Sekhar Ramakrishnan from Columbia University, talked to Dr. Kothari by telephone last week to finalize the dates for his lecture tour. We also conveyed to him the responses we received. Dr. Kothari agreed to visit North America for an extended period of 3 weeks. However, he felt that given the current situation in Punjab and incidents related to communal tension between Muslims and Hindus in Northern India as a result of opening of a temple in Ayodya, he would rather want to be in India in the next two or three months. So, he would like to postpone his tour from April to September. Although it was disappointing for us to learn that he will not be able to come here in April as was previously planned, yet he has valid reasons for postponing the tour to September. As a result, it was decided that he will instead come to the NYC around 15th September. He will go to places on the east coast for about first 10 days; then he will fly to the west coast to go to places for about 5-7 days, and then return to NYC to fly back to India around 10th Oct. I hope that this schedule will fit in your plans for the fall semester. We are also considering to invite a well-respected Muslim intellectual and author, Asghar Ali Engineer and the co-editor and co-founder of a woman's magazine Manushi, Madhu Kishwar in the next 12 months or so. Any help or ideas in planning their tours will be most welcome. If you have any suggestions about some other socially conscious persons that we should consider inviting for lecture tours, please let us know. ..... Deepak Kapur --------