Participants prepare to speak their mind

The event will be hosting a number of prominent speakers from all over the country, including Member of Parliament (MP) Anu Aga, singer Usha Uthup, journalist and blogger Sunny Hundal and founder of Women's Cancer Initiative and breast cancer survivor Devieka Bhojwani.

Usha Uthup and Anu Aga

In the first edition of the ‘TEDx Talks' in the city, many critical topics will be discussed - ranging from NASA's space programmes to music, and even
death.u00a0When contacted, Anu Aga said, "At TEDxPune, I will talk about ‘My personal experience of dealing with death'.

Through my dialogue, I hope to communicate to the audiences that death is inevitable, and hence we cannot run away from it and have to learn to accept it graciously. As against popular belief, I have come to realise through my experiences that death is just a natural process like birth and should not be treated as a disaster or tragedy.

To me, tragedy is when we do not get along with the living, and disaster is when we stop growing emotionally and spiritually."u00a0While addressing the youth, Usha Uthup is hoping to see them being more patient. "My advice to young singers is to hang in there, don't give up. Believe in yourself. Be 100% honest and practice, practice and practice. There are no shortcuts to success.
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Dedication, devotion, love and respect for what you do and your audience and musicians is paramount."u00a0Sunny Hundal, author of the recently released e-book ‘India Dishonored: Behind a Nation's War On Women', will converse about the neglected sections of women.

He said, "As a man of Indian origin, I have always felt I needed to raise my voice against violence against women by Indian men. Until recently, I focused on the UK. But after the gang rape in Delhi late last year, I became more interested in what was happening in India.u00a0The approximate figure of ‘60 million missing women' is an attempt to explain the scale of the problem."

Other speakers at TEDxPune include Anu Acharya, Aisha Chaudhary, Shravani Hagargi, Sudha Menon, Will Muir, Prof. Sujata Ramdori, Adv Asim Sarode and Vandana Suryawanshi.

Did you know?
TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) is a global set of conferences owned by the private non-profit Sapling Foundation, under the slogan ‘ideas worth spreading'. TED was founded in 1984 as a one-off event. The annual conference began in 1990, in Monterey, California. TED's early emphasis was technology and design, consistent with its origins in the Silicon Valley.u00a0