3 min readMumbaiUpdated: Feb 13, 2026 03:19 PM IST
In her first response on the cancellation of a discussion involving activist Anand Teltumbde at the Kala Ghoda Arts Festival (KGAF) on the orders of the Mumbai Police, festival director Brinda Miller said she was unaware of the controversy until the police reached out to her.
Stating that “controversy and unnecessary sensationalism are best avoided”, Miller said that as the festival director, its safety is paramount to her.
A book discussion titled “Incarcerated: Tales from Behind Bars” was scheduled for February 6 and it saw Teltumbde along with writer Neeta Kolhatkar (author of The Feared: Conversations with Eleven Political Prisoners), and was to be moderated by Scroll editor Naresh Fernandes.
An academician, author and former IIT professor, Teltumbde was arrested in April 2020 in connection with the Elgaar Parishad case and was granted bail by the Bombay High Court in November 2022.
“I was unaware about the issue till the time the Police pointed it out to me (the backlash on the internet) and that he is a political prisoner. I then reached out to my literature curator, who told me that the event is only about his book (The Cell and the Soul: A Prison Memoir), more from the psychological point of view. The book had already cleared the censor board,” she told The Indian Express, adding, “We immediately cancelled the event and told the panellists to take down their posts as well. But they spoke to the media and people overreacted.”
A description of the event on KGAF programme calendar read: “What does it mean to lose one’s freedom for an idea? Drawing on political prisoners’ narratives, Anand Teltumbde, Neeta Kolhatkar, and Naresh Fernandes discuss how imprisonment becomes both a site of punishment and profound reflection.”
“Controversy and unnecessary sensationalism are best avoided. I think it was unnecessarily blown out of proportion on social media. Many years ago, almost about 12 years ago, we had faced a similar issue with a theatrical play.
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People gathered and started protesting, we cancelled it too and those artists had to retreat back to Hyderabad from where they came from,” said Miller, adding that she has not read the book.
“And I don’t want to either, so that I am not biased. I am not saying I am for it or against it. I am neutral because I have a bigger responsibility towards KGAF, and as Festival Director, its safety is paramount to me,” she said.
When asked whether this set a wrong precedent that ‘protest and we shall listen’, she said, “We did it then, we had to do it now. Honestly, I personally don’t think much about it. Look at the US, and a few other countries where they had all the freedom before but no longer do.”
