Gita Mehta is a writer in every sense of the word though she doesn't consider herself a professional writer. She is a journalist, documentary filmmaker, promoter of the Indian experience, and writer. She writes nonfiction books and novels because she has something to say about her varied experiences.
Gita Mehata was born in southern India in 1944. Her father was an industrialist, flying ace, and politician. Mehta witnessed India's transition from a jewel in Britain's crown to a member of the Commonwealth of Nations. Mehta's childhood was far from typical. She was born barely three weeks before her father, Biju Patnaik, was carted off to jail by the British during India's sruggle for independence. One of her father's cousins, a nineteen year old poet, had been shot dead on the steps of the Chittagong armory in a bold bid inspired by the Easter uprising in Dublin, Ireland. Another Cousin, aged fourteen, was taken in chains to the Andaman Islands and imprissoned for seventeen years. When Mehta was bearly three, she was packed off to a boarding school in Kashmir run by nuns. Her mother, even though sheltered by her family, was now linked to the revolutionary movement, and was busy trying to get her father out of jail. It was into this unique family setting that Mehta was born, at a juncturein India's evolution which energized people with the dream of what India could be. Mehta's father, who had been a leading industralist in india,abondened his business interests to devote himself to politics. In 1994, he was chief minister of Orissa, an eastern state in India with a population of thirty-two million.
It is said by people who know her that Mehta is a witty,opinionated person who is always open to new ideas and experiences. At age forty, she did a parachute jump with a British military squadron. But she did not challange herself with
physically taxing adventures in pursuit of eternal youth, she assured Christa Worthington of Harper's Bazaar in 1989: "I am an Asian woman....Possibly because one is Indian,it's not terrifying to grow up. As we grow older,we're given more authority and respect."
Biography/interview- by Vogue April 1997.
India star article-interview- by C.J.S. Wallia.
After the Raj- Book review by Barbara Crossette
"MakingIndiaAccessible"- Publishers weekly-interview by Wendy Smith,May 12'97.
"The next century is ours"- Forbes-interview by Shailaja Neelakantan,June 16'97.
Sources-
Buck, Joan Juliet. "A Mehta of Style." Vanity Fair, May 1993.
Worthington, Christa. "Gita Mehta." Harper's Bazaar,1989,p.73.
Zia, Helen and Gall, Susan B. Notable Asian Americans, 1995, p.247.
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