Ravikant

Ravikant is a bilingual historian, writer, and translator. He read, researched, and taught modern Indian and world history in various colleges of Delhi University before joining the Centre’s Sarai programme at its inception in 2000. At Sarai Ravikant coordinated projects on language, free software, and media for a decade; this involved editorial, administrative, and intellectual engagements with the programme’s tech and Indic language networks including independent and free software Fellows. Ravikant’s collaboratively edited books include Translating Partition: Stories, Essays, Criticism with Tarun K. Saint (2001); Deewan e Sarai 01: Media Vimarsh: Hindi Janpad (2002), Deewan e Sarai 02: Shaharnama with Sanjay Sharma (2005); Working Questions: Independent Research and Interdisciplinary Practice (with Vivek Narayan); Betilism Raat, a translation (by Yogendra Dutt) of Wolfgang Schivelbusch’s Disenchanted Night: The Industrialisation of Light in the Nineteenth Century and Sarvahara Raatein, a translation (by Abhay Dubey) of Jacques Rancière’s The Nights of Labour; Ummeed Hogi Koi: Gujarat (2002–06) by Saroop Dhruv, and the Medianagar series edited by Rakesh Kr. Singh. His collaborative filmography includes Andaz Production’s Kali Shalwar (2001), an adaptation of Saadat Hasan Manto’s eponymous story, and Jo Dooba So Paar (2011).

Ravikant’s current social history project, ‘Words in Motion Pictures’, navigates inter-media sites such as print, broadcasting, and web in an effort to offer creative connections between these media forms and their diverse publics. He also works for the Indian Languages programme at CSDS and its peer-reviewed journal Pratimaan. Some of his recent writings can be found on weblogs such as Kafila, Rachnakar, Gadyakosh, Janaki Pul, and the Deewan mailing list, which he manages.