Category: International

A Legend Before Slumdog

 

lbsNavid Akhtar explores the phenomenally successful career of Oscar-winning Slumdog Millionaire composer A.R. Rahman – dubbed by Time magazine as “The Mozart of Madras”. (1 x 28′)

First broadcast April 2007 BBC Radio 4

Contributors include:  Andrew Lloyd Webber, film director Mani Ratnam, commercials director Rajiv Menon, biographer Kamini Mathai, writer on Indian cinema Nasreen Munni Kabir, lyricist Don Black and A.R. Rahman himself (pictured in his London studio).

Producer Mukti Jain Campion

Radio Choice: The Guardian , The Sunday Telegraph, The Independent, Daily Mail, The Times, Time Out.

 

A Sunparched Country

 

spcCaroline Holmes discovers how Australia is facing up to its worst drought on record and meets people who are at the vanguard of innovative, practical adaptations to the new reality of climate change.  (5 x 14′)

First broadcast April – May 2008 BBC Radio 4

Producer Mukti Jain Campion

 

This series is clear, unpreachy, imaginative, positive.  – Gillian Reynolds, The Daily Telegraph

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Black Screen Britain

Actor Burt Caesar presents two programmes exploring how British film and television drama from the 1950s to the 1970s portrayed the lives of African-Caribbean immigrants. (2 x 28′)

First Broadcast  March – April  2009   BBC Radio 4

1: Ambassadors for the Race  The pioneering black actors who made their names in  A Man from the Sun, Fable, Pool of London, Flame in the Streets and Jemima and Johnny.

2: Reclaiming Our Image  Burt Caesar charts the landmark screen dramas such as Pressure, Empire Road and Burning an Illusion which presented an alternative view of black lives in Britain during the 1970s.

Contributors include: actors Earl Cameron CBE, Mona Hammond, Cy Grant, Joan Hooley, Rudolph Walker, writer Michael Abbensetts, film makers John Akomfrah OBE, Menelek Shabazz, Alrick Riley, commentators June Givanni, Dr Jim Pines and Baroness Lola Young.

Producer Mukti Jain Campion

Radio Choice: The Guardian, the Observer, The Independent & The Times.

Radio 4 Pick of the Week

Most of the films discussed in this series can be viewed free of charge at the BFI Southbank’s Mediatheque in London or at the Quad in Derby

Blogging Against Bribery

 

babIn April 2011 the web was set abuzz by the hunger protest of 72 year old Anna Hazare, demanding that the Indian Government draft a tough new anti-corruption bill. His fast in Delhi was supported by campaigners across India and the world, fuelled by Facebook and Twitter to make it the most successful use of the internet and social media in an Indian protest. Mukti Jain Campion reports from Bangalore on this new trend for click-tivism and examines an innovative anti-bribery website called ipaidabribe.com (1 x 28′)

First broadcast  June  2011 BBC Radio 4

Producer Mukti Jain Campion      Executive Producer Charles Miller

 

In top 5 most popular stories of the day on BBC World News website

The War Widows of Afghanistan

 

BBC Radio 4 BBC World ServiceLisa and Jacqui live in Britain. Tajbibi and Marzia live in Afghanistan. All four women have lost their husbands in the war against the Taliban. As the deadline for NATO troop withdrawal approaches, Zarghuna Kargar hears their moving stories of love, loss and survival. (1 x 28′)

First broadcast July 2014   BBC Radio 4 & BBC World Service

Producer Mukti Jain Campion

One of the most gripping programmes I have heard in years. – Lesley Abdela

 

The interweaving of the experience of Afghan and British widows, with each commenting on the similarities and contrast in each other’s experiences, was masterful. – Peter Horrocks, Director BBC World Service

 

Radio Choice: The Daily Mail & The Sunday Telegraph

Hearing ear

 

Broken Paradise

 

bpAcclaimed translator Lakshmi Holmström introduces some of the most powerful Tamil poetry to emerge from the 26 year long conflict in Sri Lanka in which an estimated 70,000 people were killed as the militant Tamil Tigers tried to establish a separate Tamil state in the north of the island. (1 x 28′)

First broadcast   April 2013        BBC Radio 4

Poets featured include Cheran, M.A.Nuhman, Sivaramani, Shanmugam Sivalingam and Kutti Revathi.

Poem readings by Hiran Abeysekara, Vayu Naidu and Vignarajah

Producer Mukti Jain Campion

 

In a Time of Burning (Arc Publications 2013) is a collection of Cheran poems translated by Lakshmi Holmström

Bush Lessons

 

bl23-year-old Shrewsbury graduate Ruth Charlton went to teach in one of the most remote bush schools in the Limpopo Province of South Africa for three months – but stayed for twelve. Her vividly written diaries and letters home chronicle a year of her class’s progress and her own journey from the naivety of an innocent abroad to a woman drawn into the complexities of modern South Africa. (3 x 14′)

First broadcast December 2003  BBC Radio 4

Producer Chris Eldon Lee

Radio 4 Pick of the Week

Designing The Impossible

 

dtiHow would you like to experience a volcanic eruption in your living room? Could you create dark energy in your kitchen sink? Or, perhaps you dream of becoming an astronaut?

Enter the surreal world of Nelly Ben Hayoun, acclaimed designer of fantasy experiences, who brings the thrill of cutting edge science into everyday life. (1 x 28′)

First broadcast Sept  2013   BBC Radio 4

 

Contributors: Thrill engineer Brendan Walker, Foley Artist Sue Harding, former NASA astronaut trainer Annette Rodrigues, musician Arthur Jeffes and the International Space Orchestra

Producer / Presenter Mukti Jain Campion

Bengal to Baker Street in 80 Paintings

Mukti Jain Campion discovers the story of pioneering Indian modern artist Jamini Roy (1887 – 1972) and how the largest collection of his work came to hang in a private apartment in central London. (1 x 28′)

See Slideshow of the paintings discussed in the programme.

First broadcast March 2014  BBC Radio 4

Contributors include: Professor Nirmalya Kumar (pictured), Collector of Jamini Roy’s paintings; Richard Blurton, Curator of South Asian Art at the British Museum; Partha Mitter, Emeritus Professor of Art History, University of Sussex; Sona Datta, art historian, curator and author of book on Jamini Roy “Urban Patua”; Artist Sir Howard Hodgkin

Producer Mukti Jain Campion

This is a fascinating programme about art, its collection, its inspiration, its social value and how attitudes of critics and art historians change over time – Gillian Reynolds, The Daily Telegraph

 

Radio Choice: The Times, The Daily Mail, The Daily Telegraph, The Independent, The Observer and Radio Times

The Drawings on the Wall

 

dotwArchaeologist Dr George Nash of Bristol University visits five of Western Europe’s most significant prehistoric rock art sites to examine whether the modern mind can ever successfully interpret the mysterious graffiti created by our ancestors. ( 5 x 14′)

First broadcast February 2008   BBC Radio 4

Producer Chris Eldon Lee

 

 

1.The Legless Ladies of Creswell Crags  Church Hole cave  in Derbyshire has spectacular images of prehistoric animals. But who was carving them and why? And what is the modern equivalent?

2. Graffiti Gorge George Nash meets Dr Mila Simoes de Abreu, whose bitterly-fought campaign in the Côa Valley saved thousands of prehistoric tribal rock carvings from being lost under the waters of a proposed reservoir.

3. Irish Illusions Dr Muiris O’Sullivan of University College, Dublin inside Fourknocks Passage Grave, Eire

4. The Master of Paspardo Italian archaeologists Professor Angelo Fossati and Dr Andrea Arca explore the biggest rock art area in Europe.

5.Architecture of Death Mike Yates and rock art photographer Adam Stanford visit Barclodiady-Gawres Neolithic burial chamber in Anglesey

See the BBC website for the series.

Radio 4 Pick of the Week