Why Mahima Sethi’s ‘Ink From Night Skies’ deserved the praise and the blessings it got from Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik
Mahima Sethi, a budding poet and a B.Tech graduate from IIT Mumbai, received the ultimate reward for her labour of love when the Chief Minister of Odisha released her maiden poetry collection, “Ink from Night Skies”, yesterday.
To have an ever-popular head of a government appreciate and launch your book is an immense honour in itself, but the joy and satisfaction thereof must be doubly so when the person concerned is an intellectual and literary figure of such considerable distinction as Naveen Patnaik.
A chip off the old block, Mahima was accompanied on the occasion by proud father Bishnupada Sethi –himself an acclaimed poet and litterateur, apart from being a prominent bureaucrat who is currently serving the Government of Odisha as Principal Secretary of three departments: Revenue and Disaster Management; Odia Language, Literature and Culture; and Information & Public Relations.
Mahima’s dream debut in the world of literature, an anthology of 110 poems, is a work of unbridled imagination put down – with brilliant simplicity – into words. On the whole, the book serves as an intimately engaging gateway into the young poet’s insecurities and vulnerabilities, her optimism and convictions, her social- and self-awareness, and the spiritual grounding that informs her perception of – and reaction to – everything within and around her.
With her prodigious wisdom and prolific output, Mahima has more than earned the praise and encouragement of the five-time Chief Minister.
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