Draft:Navina Sundaram

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Navina Sundaram (2013)

Navina Sundaram

Navina Sundaram (* 1 September 1945 in Shimla, Himachal Pradesh, India; † 24 April 2022 in Hamburg), was an Indian-German television journalist, filmmaker and author. From 1964 to 2003, she was a political editor for Norddeutscher Rundfunk and a foreign correspondent for ARD. She was the first television journalist with a migration background to present renowned programmes such as Weltspiegel, extra 3 and Panorama.

Life

Family, Youth and Education

Navina Sundaram was born into a prominent Hungarian-Indian family of artists. Her grandfather Umrao Singh Sher-Gil (1870–1954) was a philosopher, artist and photographer from Punjab. Her aunt Amrita Sher-Gil (1913–1941), an eminent painter, is regarded as a pioneer of Indian modernism. Navina Sundaram's brother Vivan Sundaram (1943–2023) was one of India's most important contemporary visual artists. The siblings' grew up in an intellectual and cosmopolitan environment, their upbringing influenced by the young Republic of India under Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru (1889–1964), a secular, parliamentary democracy, which, among other things, gave significant impetus to the Alliance of Non-Aligned Countries.

After completing her schooling at the private The Lawrence School in Sanawar, near Shimla, Navina Sundaram studied English Literature at the University of Delhi.

Navina Sundaram became a German citizen in 1987.

After her marriage, she temporarily took the name Navina Sundaram-Rummel.

On the night of 25th April 2022, Navina Sundaram succumbed to chronic lung disease and died in Hamburg at the age of 76.

Journalistic Career

Navina Sundaram first appeared on German television thanks to a family friend, Hans Walter Berg (1916–2003), who was then a correspondent and the head of ARD television studio in New Delhi. At Berg's request, she became the presenter of the series Asiatische Miniaturen (Asian Miniatures), which was produced in India from 1963. Not being able to speak a word of German at the time, she learnt the texts by heart and recited them for television. She was then invited to attend a two-year training course for television journalists at NDR in Hamburg. From June 1964, she worked as a trainee in various departments of the broadcaster, from the Tagesschau newsroom to the television drama department under the direction of Egon Monk and the NDR radio's Nachwuchsstudio(young talent studio) under Axel Eggebrecht.

In 1966, she returned to the television studio in New Delhi as assistant director for almost two years. From 1970 to 2004, Navina Sundaram was a permanent editor at NDR, first in the current affairs department and later as a foreign correspondent. She then worked as a freelance journalist.

Writing in the German daily Taz, she described how in the 1970s and 1980s women on the talk show Der Internationale Frühschoppen were merely exotic figures in the men's club . She and Pakistani journalist Roshan Dhunjibhoy took turns representing the "other world". Much to the disappointment of host Werner Höfers, she always chose to appear in European clothes.

There are two thematic strands that run through the entire body of Navina Sundaram's work. On the one hand, she has repeatedly focused on the countries of the Global South, especially on South Asia and Africa, the struggles for independence, the complex processes of decolonisation, but also the impact of international development aid, the monetary policies of the IMF and the World Bank, and environmental issues. On the other hand, within the domestic political discourse in Germany, Sundaram was interested in the situation of people who had experienced migration, asylum seekers and those affected by everyday racism. She also addressed contemporary political demands for equality and the recognition of human rights.

Films, TV reports, Presentations (selection)

Films

• 1967: Bharata Natyam
• 1968: Black man, what now?
• 1970: On the path to bliss
• 1971: Portrait of a Patriot - The Saga of Subhas Chandra Bose 1941-1945
• 1972: So long as there are tears
• 1973: Freedom and its Price
• 1973: Darshan Singh wants to live in Leverkusen
• 1974: Talking, my drug - Singing, my sex...
• 1976: My city, your city
• 1977: Ordered to leave Germany
• 1979: When the welcome speeches fade away
• 1982: Only one of forty
• 1983: Summer guests
• 1989: Behind every curtain...
• 1993: The little slaves - Child Labour in India
• 1994: When ships die
• 2007: Amrita Sher-Gil: A family album

TV reports (selection)

• 1973: Disquiet over the Nobel Peace Prize (Weltspiegel)
• 1975: Portrait Mujibur Rahman (Weltspiegel)
• 1976: Spaniens Abzug aus West-Sahara (tagesschau, Weltspiegel)
• 1976: Interview with Edward Braithwaite (Weltspiegel III)
• 1976: The Legacy of Amílcar Cabral (Weltspiegel)
• 1977: Portrait George Fernandes (Weltspiegel)
• 1978: Ransom for GDR citizens (extra drei)
• 1978: Amnesty International - Animal testing (tagesthemen)
• 1979: Two-fold asylum law (Panorama)
• 1979: India: Vanity Contest (Weltspiegel)
• 1982: Asylum in the Federal Republic (Panorama)
• 1982: Foreigners' test (extra drei)
• 1982: Binational marriages (Panorama)
• 1982: Rehabilitation Centre for Torture Victims (tagesthemen)
• 1983: Women's shelters (tagesschau)
• 1983: The case of Kemal Altun (Panorama)
• 1984: Midnight's Children / Salman Rushdie
• 1984: Human Rights Day (Weltspiegel)
• 1991: Bundestag debate § 218 (Commentary, tagesthemen)
• 1992: India: Hindus and Muslims (Weltspiegel)
• 1993: India: Hindus on the warpath (Weltspiegel)

Presentations

• 1963–1964: Asiatische Miniaturen
• 1973–1996 (not on a regular basis): Weltspiegel, Panorama, Gesichter Asiens,Weltjournal, ARD-Flashpoints and special broadcasts

Texts, Lectures, Publications (selection)

• Thoughts on the Employment of Media in Developing Countries. Sundaram, Navina (1979): in Peter Herrmann & Rainer Kabel (eds.), Media, Technology, Development: The Role of Media Adapted By Developing Countries. Berlin: Spiess.
• Internationaler Künstler-und Kulturaustausch mit der Dritten Welt. Reports and discussions on the film Sommergäste:- Künstlertreffen am Himalaya in the publication series of the Braunschweig University of Art, Volume 7, documentation of the symposiums from 11-13 April 1984.
• Westliche Zivilisation – Befreiung für die Frauen in der Dritten Welt? Speech given at the 1986 Development Policy Symposium in Duisburg – Documentation
• Gedanken zu Europa. (Frankfurter Rundschau) 3 April 1992.
• Frau und Fremd in den Medien. Lecture on International Women's Day on 6. März 1996 at the Landesfunkhaus Hannover (reprinted in TEXTE ZUR MEDIENPÄDAGOGIK Niedersächsisches Landesinstitut für Fortbildung und Weiterbildung im Schulwesen und Medienpädagogik (NLI) 1997).
• Wir machen unser eigenes Bild: Migrantinnen in den Medien, Medien für Migrantinnen. Published in 1998 Auf zum Marsch in die Institutionen! Migrantinnen und Migranten in staatlichen und nichtstaatlichen Einrichtungen – Dokumentation der vierten landesweiten Konferenz der Migrantinnen, Migranten und Flüchtlinge in Niedersachsen, AMFN Publisher. ISBN 3-9806150-0-6
• Mehr Farbe in den Medien oder der alltägliche Rassismus in den Redaktionsstuben.
• Für eine Kultur der Differenzen – Friedens-und Dritte-Welt-Zeitschriften auf dem Prüfstand. Minutes of the conference published by the Ev. Akademie Iserlohn in the Institut für Kirche und Gesellschaft, 2004. ISBN 3-931845-80-X.
• Das Bild des Anderen. Die Erfahrungen einer Inderin in Deutschland und einer Deutschen in Indien. TAZ Magazine, 6/7 August 2005.
• An Outsider's Inside View or an Insider's Outside View – India on German TV 1957–2005.
• Import Export Cultural Transfer India/Germany/Austria. 2005 Parthas Publisher, ISBN 3-86601-910-6.
• Grüblerisches zum Thema ‚Heimat in der Fremde'. In: Heimat in der Fremde, Migrationsgeschichten von Menschen aus Indien in Deutschland, Draupadi Publisher, 2008, ISBN 978-3-937603-30-8.

Honorary involvement

• Member of the Development Policy Advisory Council of the Hamburg Senate, chaired by Ingomar Hauchler, convened by the red-green coalition in August 1999; she was involved in drawing up guidelines for a Hamburg development policy in line with Agenda 21. The Council's attempt to continue its work after the change of government ended with its resignation on 29 March 2004.
• Member of the Board of Trustees of the Norddeutsche Stiftung für Umwelt und Entwicklung (NUE) from 1999.

Weblinks

• The Fifth Wall – Media library with works by Navina Sundaram.
• Deutschlandfunk Zwischentöne. Music and Questions to the person on 16 January 2022: Die Journalistin Navina Sundaram „Jede Art von Diversität ist ein Vorteil", Moderation: Marietta Schwarz