Aug 16 2025 to Aug 16 2025 6 p.m.

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Where

Champaca Bookstore, Library and Cafe

7/1 Edward Road, Off Queens Road 560052

Event Description

Join us on Saturday, 16 August, for a thoughtful and illuminating conversation around WATER DAYS, Sundar Sarukkai’s second novel, following a chaotic Bangalore locality over the course of the thirteen days after a young girl’s death. Sundar will be in conversation with Srikar Raghavan, as they meditate on questions of language, belonging, and the many ways in which the city makes its presence felt in our lives.

Here are the details of the event:

Date: August 16 2025, Saturday

Time: 6PM

Venue: Champaca Bookstore, Vasanth Nagar

Since there is limited seating, we recommend that you confirm your spot here!

About the book:

At the cusp of the millennium, in a fast-changing neighbourhood in Bangalore, Kannada, Malayalam, Tamil, Telugu and Hindi form a buzzing background of muted conversations as speculation mounts about what really happened that night when a girl barely out of her teens died. Raghavendra, erstwhile security guard dreaming of setting up his own grocery store, finds himself unexpectedly in the middle of it all, tasked with the responsibility of finding out the truth by his wife Poornima.

And every morning, for the thirteen days that it takes for the soul to find liberation and the story its resolution, the women gather at the water taps before sunrise, collecting water and stories…

About the speakers:

Sundar Sarukkai is a philosopher and writer, working primarily in the philosophy of the natural and social sciences. He was the Founder-Director of the Manipal Centre for Philosophy and Humanities from 2010-2015, has taught at several institutions, and is the founder of Barefoot Philosophers, an initiative dedicated to making philosophy accessible to children and the public. His books include The Social Life of Democracy, Experience, Caste, and the Everyday Social, and Philosophy for Children. Water Days is his second novel, after 2023’s Following a Prayer.

Moderating the discussion is Srikar Raghavan, an independent researcher and writer from Mysore. He was a recipient of the New India Foundation Fellowship in 2021, which paved the way to his debut work of narrative nonfiction, Rama Bhima Soma, a socio-cultural history of modern Karnataka. An inveterate bookworm, Srikar also loves to trek, travel, hunt down obscure books, and fiddle around on a guitar.