The Shabad World Poetry Festival, which took place at Meghdoot Theatre Complex in Rabindra Bhavan in New Delhi, was organized by Ministry of Culture of India during the celebrations of 150th Birth Anniversary of Swami Vivekananda and 100th year of Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore’s receiving the Nobel Prize.

Miloslav Topinka was one of the main guests of the Shabad World Poetry Festival, together with poets from India, United Kingdom, Australia, USA, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Denmark, Ireland, Norway, Macedonia, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Philippines, Seychelles, Cuba or Nigeria.

During his author reading, Miloslav Topinka presented to the audience of more than 150 people pieces of poetry, characterized by the combination of philosophy, religion and science.

Miloslav Topinka is an internationally acclaimed poet. He was born in Czechoslovakia in 1945. He studied psychology at Charles University in Prague and earned a doctoral degree in 1970. His first Collection of poetry “UTOPIR /a neologism resonating with the Czech words for vampire, drowning, wheatgrass/” was published in 1969. Some of his other works include controversial “The Rat’s Nest” which was banned in Czechoslovakia until 1990, “the Crack” and translation of Rimbaud`s “Letters of the Visionary“ into Czech as well as translation of some texts from Rimbaud`s “Illuminations.” Topinka won many awards for his works like International Herber Foundation Prize,  the “Seifert Prize“ - the highest  poetry award in the Czech Republic and .X.Salda Prize“ – the highest award for fine arts, literary criticism and essayistics in the Czech Republic. During his work, Topinka was member of many societies and foundations and travelled extensively in many countries.

Integral parts of the festival were panel discussions on various topics such as timelessness. The festival was accompanied by Odissi Dance performance and Sufi singings. Poetry Books by the specially invited Poets were displayed at the Poetry Festival.