A Punjabi song on the Bengal famine originally rendered

by Lahore-born theatre-person Sheela Bhatia, who settled in Delhi post the 1947 Partition and a Bengali song by Binoy Roy hailing North Malabar's Kayyur Revolution was followed by an Urdu song by Hyderabadi poet Makhdoom Mohiuddin. Sumangala followed it up with an invocation of slain street-theatre activist Safdar Hashmi and "Parcham", the progressive music squad. A vibrant song of 18th-century Punjabi Sufi poet Bulleh Shah was rendered by Harmeet after which Tapan presented an item on the cello, essaying the "pangs of living beings besides humans on earth". Sumangala, a trained classical vocalist, ended her performance with a Bhupen Hazarika hit of Aditya Nigam lyrics about Assam's palanquin bearers. "A large number of these songs are forgotten or have remained limited in reach, confined to specific regions, collections, or to the memories of those still alive today," adds the scholar, who says she has been researching on the subject for a decade now.