Poetry recitation, plays mark Hindi Diwas

To commemorate the adoption of Hindi as official language of the Indian Union by the Constituent Assembly in 1949, 'Hindi Diwas' was celebrated in different schools, colleges and offices in Shimla as well as in Himachal Pradesh University (HPU) on Wednesday.

Besides various cultural programmes, Hindi poetry recital sessions, debates, essay-writing competitions, quiz sessions, plays and one-act plays were organized in St Bede's, RKMV, Kotshera and Sanjauli colleges, the university and various schools here. Hindi Week celebrations also started in different offices, including the accountant general's where debates, Hindi typing and other competitions will be held throughout the week from Wednesday.

Chief minister P K Dhumal, while honouring officials at the state-level Hindi Diwas celebrations for carrying out work in the language, said, "It is the responsibility of every individual to protect the cultural identities, including mother language." He declared that honorarium for litterateurs and writers would be increased from Rs 250 to Rs 1,000 in the state. The language and culture (LAC) department, in association with theatre organizations HCRFTA and Sankalp, staged the adaption of Mahasweta Devi's acclaimed novel 'Hazaar Chaurasi ki Maa' at Gaiety Theatre. General secretary of Sankalp theatre organization Kedar Thakur said the play directed by Aayan Das Gupta "revolves around the feelings of a mother whose son has been involved in Naxalite movement and it is a tribute to motherhood and is being staged to celebrate the day of our mother tongue, Hindi.

Source: https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Poetry-recitation-plays-mark-Hindi-Diwas/articleshow/9988473.cms

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Agrahyah Technologies launches India’s first audio-on demand platform

Agrahyah Technologies has launched aawaz.com, an audio on demand platform with professionally generated content in vernacular languages. With this, people can listen to podcasts, chat shows, interviews and also read articles and features. Aawaz.com is currently available in Hindi, and as both website and Android app.

Aawaz.com will also have ML (machine learning) and AI (artificial capabilities) based capabilities to recommend and personalize content based on user’s preferences. With the app, people can listen to over 150 hours of audio content which is scripted, recorded, and presented as podcasts and shows. Both audio and text content are spread across multiple genres including entertainment, lifestyle, health, fiction, literature, devotional, comedy, humor and more.

India’s on-demand audio or podcast as an industry is very nascent and Aawaz.com aims to be an early mover and learn and grow with a new generation of audience who are increasingly consuming passive content such as podcast while performing another task like driving or cooking.

With Aawaz.com, Agrahyah aims to take the lead in offering brands an innovative, ad free, and engaging platform while offering consumers an easy access to rich, culturally relevant content accessible through mobile and web. As a first of its kind platform in Hindi, Aawaz offers both audio content and text content bundled into one, and both of them are created professionally in-house by Agrahyah Technologies.

Speaking about the launch, Sreeraman Thiagarajan, cofounder of Agrahyah Technologies in a statement said, “Aawaz.com is our way of making the web useful to people by providing high quality and genuine content created by subject matter experts. While we are striving to make content useful, it is also entertaining.”

Source: https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/small-biz/startups/newsbuzz/agrahyah-technologies-launches-indias-first-audio-on-demand-platform/articleshow/67555585.cms

Read more about: Hindi Literature Video