Madras Cafe Unlocked

Welcome to Madras Café Unlocked

In response to WOMAD Festival being cancelled this year,

Madras Cafe and Action Village India created its own FREE re-imagined event: Madras Café Unlocked!

An online gathering of food, festivities, music, solidarity and humanity

in support of rural communities in India.

Accessing the events:

Although the event is now over, you can access all the activities by going to the different stages (either via the menu or the festival map below).

Upcoming Events:

Wednesday 23rd Sep, 12:30 pm: Engaging young women and men towards a gender just society' Panel Discussion

Thursday 24th September, 18:00: Food Justice - a grassroots perspective from the West Midlands, UK

Saturday 26th September, all day: The Meal - a virtual, distanced international meal to support Jai Jagat’s vision of global and local Justice and Peace.

Madras Boombox

Welcome to Madras Boombox where you can find something for all tastes, from world class maestros to emerging talent, including classical Indian concerts and tribal Indian music.

Exhibition: Food for Peace and Justice

Our exhibition showcases inspiring stories and events illustrating the links between food, social justice and peace. We explore the work of: Ekta Parishad and their global campaign Jai Jagat 2020 – a non-violent movement for peace and justice; Madras Café; AVI and others.

Partnership and Solidarity

Enter, to hear directly from Action Village India’s partners and other development actors in a series of live discussions from end July to Sept covering: COVID, Challenges and Responses; Climate Justice; Struggles for rights and justice; Disability rights; Women’s and girls’ rights.

Shop

Shop - 100% Fair prices for artisans, 100% Profit for rural development All our carefully selected products are hand-made by artisans in India, many of whose craft is under threat. 100% of profits from the products’ sale go to Action Village India’s development projects and partners in rural India. All products are traceable to their origin. You can also find Madras Cafe Cookbook 2 in our shop.

People's Tent

Welcome to the musicians and performers who are Friends and Supporters of Action Village India and Madras Café.

Poetree

Enjoy this collection of live recordings of poetry on food, justice, peace, community and climate.

Please Support us

We hope you enjoy the festival. At WOMAD, we normally raise over £25,000 to support rural communities in India. Unfortunately, this isn't possible this year, so we appreciate any donation you are able to contribute.

Food for Thought

Step into our food tent for the launch of the Madras Café Cookbook 2, offering you easy, home-made and delicious Indian food. Featuring sessions with our popular cooks, including: the Tastes of the Thali and the Quest for the perfect Idli. Served, of course, with a wonderful cup of chai.

Madras Cafe Family

From building our tent to the final volunteer party, come and meet the people behind the Madras Café, chat to fellow volunteers, attend dance and yoga workshops and tune in to our volunteers’ playlist.

Message Corner

Leave your message and have a chat with fellow festivalgoers.

What a wonderful weekend of partnership, solidarity and humanity! It was incredible! Thank you to all the wonderful people who have been involved in making this first online festival possible...

You know who you are but below is a non-exhaustive list of some of the wonderful people who made it all happen:

Cerys Matthews, Kanwal Ahluwalia, Vikram Nayak, Meera Patel, Roopa Pansar, Shabaz, Rajagopal and Jill and their technical team from Ekta Parishad, Dilip Banerjee, Satish Girija, Ramesh Sharma, Anindita Majumdar, Anand Abhinav, Darbar, Giuliano Modarelli, Gurdain Rayatt, Guy Singh-Watson, Anya Nanning Ramamurthy, ChangeKitchen CIC, Riverford, Kathy Siddle, Rolf Killius, Ivan Nutbrown, Tara Douglas, Nitin Sonawane, Ansuman Biswas, Monique Truong, Sarathy Korwar,Hussain, Kaviraj Singh, Peter Gabriel, Sumanhala Damodaran, Janmejay Singh, Kishore Shah, Cambridge Curiosity and Imagination, Blue Granits, Idit Nathan and Helen Stratford, Dr Reji Thomas, Subini Nair Dr. S.Gopakumar and Dr.Saji George, Pinkie Agrawal, Matt Sowerby, Patrick Evans, Millie Gould, Merri Dodds, Rajan Naidu, JaiJagat UK, and all our amazing volunteers, staff, interns and trustees.