Centenary celebrations of Ga Di Ma’s birth anniversary to culminate on October 1

This year marks the centenary birth celebrations of Gajanan Digambar Madguḷkar, poet, lyricist, writer and actor popularly known as Ga Di Ma.

As a culmination of Ga Di Madgulkar's centenary birth celebrations, Ga Di Ma Prathishan has organised a cultural event on October 1. Last year, the celebrations kick-started with a day-long event titled Ga Di Ma, Pratibha and Pratima where three lectures by speakers Arun Mhatre, poet; Pratima Kulkarni, playwright and director and Milind Joshi, executive president, Maharashtra Sahitya Parishad were presented.

This year, on October 1, the year long festivities will be culminated through an event at Tilak Smarak Mandir, Sadashiv peth at 5pm.

The chief guest for the event will be Shrinivas Patil, former Governor of Sikkim, who is a self-confessed fan of Madgulkar's works. Anand Madgulkar, son of Ga Di Ma, shared, "Patil will accompany Sharad Pawar, chief, Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) to our home. Patil is very fond of dad's work. In fact, he has the lyrics of his favourite songs by heart."

The first half of the show, will have Ram Naik, veteran Indian politician and former governor of Uttar Pradesh share his memories on Ga Di Ma. "Naik and my father knew each other since childhood. So, he is going to talk about his memories growing up. Also, he came to stay at our bungalow in Pune when we was in college for two years. He has some fond memories of my father which he will be reliving on that day," added Anand.

The second half of the event will have poet and writer Pravin Davane present some of Ga Di Ma's popular work in a musical session. A few cultural programmes of dance and drama will also be a part of the event.