Dateline Dehradun: On 25th October 2025, the first day of the just concluded Valley of Words Litfest at Hotel Madhuban, the houseful Shabdawali Hall witnessed an interesting session of poetry reading by three poet – bureaucrats, Pramod Jain, Mugdha Sinha and Mukul Kumar. The session was moderated by son of the soil author – poet – lawyer Ajay Jugraan.
After some engaging and humorous questions by the moderator about how their gentle art of poetry survived the apparent culture of ambition, power and privilege in civil service, the at ease poet – bureaucrats read some touching poems from their books.
Chairman of the Administrative Reforms Commission of Arunachal Pradesh, Mr Jain, explained how the Prime Minister’s work ethic and use of poetry as a tool to rally people during the Covid 19 Lockdowns inspired him to write his collection, Lockdown and Other Poems, and read poems like The Candle, My Countrymen and Goodbye Babuji about human suffering and environment.
Indian Railway Traffic Services officer, Mr Kumar touched upon the catharsis he had undergone while writing poetry and read imagist and introspective poems like A Dahlia at Forty-five and The Beggar from his latest collection, Catharsis.
India Tourism Development Corporation Managing Director, Mrs Sinha briefly presented her view about the challenge of AI to original literary creativity and read some bold and beautiful epigrammatic poems like Transformation and Bulb from her collection, Postcard Poems, and a Hindi poem, Solah Shringar.
VoW Director Dr Sanjiv Chopra thanked and felicitated the participants at the end of this short and sweet program, which many in the audience felt should have been longer to do justice to the poets, poetry and for greater enjoyment.
