Wednesday, May 18, 2005

Kamat's Potpourri

Rediscovered this multiple award-winning and truly great website called Kamat's Potpourri. Used to read it regularly about 3 years ago and then somewhere down the line lost track. Found it again when I was searching for something the other day.

It was created and is maintained by a family of four, the Kamats, and I take the liberty to quote them here "Kamat's Potpourri is the personal home page of the four members of the Kamat family: Krishnanand Kamat, Jyotsna Kamat, Vikas Kamat and Hiryoung Kim Kamat. Among them, they share three Doctorates, Five Masters degrees and seven other University degrees, and Kamat's Potpourri constitutes over a hundred person-years of work."

The Kamats have put in a lot of painstaking efforts in the making and running of the website. It is a veritable treasure trove of information on India's culture and some of which is fast vanishing. Their documentation of many of the endangered communities and practices is highly commendable.

They have probably the biggest collection of pictures showcasing India and its varied culture. And the writeups are pretty fascinating as well.

Again I quote and this time, one of the reviews the website has received...
"It's presumptuous to create a site on Indian culture. To encapsulate the country's diversity in a few hundred web pages and explain its mystery in user-friendly language, is usually a disappointing attempt. The Kamats didn't attempt anything so ambitious, and succeeded beyond all expectations."

They have even been awarded the 'Site of the week' by Encyclopedia Britannica!

Check it out!