Sunil Kant Munjal has likely shared this story before, but it’s worth repeating because it involves the two great loves of his life: his late wife Mukta and the Serendipity Arts Festival in Goa, which he has proudly nurtured for a decade. He borrowed the name ‘Serendipity’ from the bookstore Mukta used to run at the Claridges Hotel in New Delhi. ‘The store eventually shut down but I managed to retain the name,’ smiles Munjal. It is a word that perfectly ‘symbolizes the festival,’ insists the 68-year-old chairman of Hero Enterprise and founder patron of the Serendipity Arts Festival. ‘In many ways, “serendipity” is about luck, but also about infinite possibilities and chance connections. Anyone who has been to the festival knows that it is full of surprises and there are always new discoveries waiting to happen at every corner.’  

Since its first edition in 2016, the annual Serendipity Arts Festival has become a defining fixture on India’s thriving cultural calendar, attracting over one million local and international visitors to date. The immersive festival – which describes itself as ‘inclusive, accessible, and democratic’ – has supported 10,000 artists, created 5,000 project-based job opportunities, and helped restore a number of historic Portuguese-era buildings across Goa’s capital Panjim where it is held every year, usually in December. Those numbers speak volumes about the quiet power of private patronage and the central role that globe-trotting, culture-loving entrepreneurs like Munjal are playing in the development of India’s creative economy. India, they say, is an old civilization but a young nation. Munjal couldn’t agree more: ‘When we got independence in 1947, we were busy building the country.’ Cultural patronage was not a top priority. ‘But today, with our economy booming, the arts sector is once again getting the attention it deserves,’ says Munjal.  

Speaking via video call, Munjal makes clear that audience reach was never his intended goal for Serendipity. Instead, he wanted it to become more meaningful by helping more people to engage with art, music, and culture, as he did when growing up in Ludhiana in the 1960s, in a household that deeply appreciated Hindustani classical music. Multi-disciplinarity lies at the core of the Serendipity Arts Festival, which celebrates not only visual culture but traverses a diverse spectrum of performing arts, such as theater and film, as well as culinary art, and craft. Munjal departed from the conventional ‘fair/biennale’ model and opted instead for a festival with a more carnivalesque feel, with the famed Goan susegad (laidback attitude) forming part of the freeing atmosphere.  

The festival has hosted satellite events in Birmingham, Paris, and Dubai, and Serendipity was an organizing partner for the National Pavilion of India at the 2026 Venice Art Biennale. Now, arguably the largest South Asian event of its kind is now set for its London debut next summer. The Victoria and Albert Museum, Science Museum and Natural History Museum will partner with Serendipity to host a festival of Indian and diasporic culture over Exhibition Road and South Kensington’s cultural quarter between June 19–27 2027. As if truly an act of ‘serendipity,’ the festival’s increasingly global footprint seems to be coinciding with India’s golden moment on the international stage. Back in usually easygoing Goa, where Munjal maintains a home, preparations are in full swing for the upcoming 11th edition of the festival kicking off on December 13. As our interview winds up, Munjal reveals his vision for another dream project: a unique public center in the heart of his hometown, New Delhi. Spread across 7.5 acres, THE BRIJ is named after Brijmohan Lall Munjal, his late father and the founder of the Hero Group. The center will continue the conversation started by the Serendipity Arts Festival ten years ago. ‘What Serendipity does in a week, THE BRIJ will sustain every day,’ affirms Munjal, promising that it will be a worthy addition to India’s burgeoning cultural scene. 

Like Munjal, Tarana Sawhney is another visionary Indian cultural leader who is reshaping the local artistic landscape. As the chairperson of the Confederation of Indian Industry’s (CII) Art & Culture Committee – a non-profit body that works at the intersection of the public, private, and creative sectors – the New Delhi-based Sawhney is perfectly placed to bring about social change in a country known for its rich heritage and timeless living traditions. Banaras, or Varanasi as it is also known, is among the oldest continually inhabited cities in the world and the holiest Hindu pilgrimage site in the country. This is a place that perfectly exemplifies the idea of India as ‘the mother of all civilizations,’ and it is in this historic city, with the sacred Ganges river flowing through it and funeral pyres burning eternally, that CII is hosting the first edition of Banaras Biennale. 

Opening on November 27 and on view until December 31, ‘Kashi/Light: City as Sensorium’ seeks to transform Banaras into a creative canvas – a month-long artistic reverie bringing contemporary art into dialogue with Banaras’s historic heritage, its peerless craft traditions, textiles, music, and dance. ‘You cannot look at Banaras in silo,’ Sawhney notes. ‘Its strength lies in its cultural and spiritual diversity, demanding a more holistic perspective.’ The Bharat Kala Bhavan museum, housed inside Banaras Hindu University, will serve as the biennale’s host venue.  

‘Bharat Kala Bhavan was founded in 1920, with Rabindranath Tagore [the Nobel Prize-winning poet] serving as its first vice-chairman. So, the kind of history this museum comes with, alongside the magnificent collection that it houses, is unparalleled,’ Sawhney explains, adding that this lesser-seen archive will open to the public for the first time as part of the biennale. Sawhney believes in the power of biennales as a space for both critical enquiry as well as public engagement. ‘I became interested in the public platform precisely because I felt there was a lot of support for residencies and grants, but not enough for public art.’

She has been a champion of art for as long as she can remember. Though she trained as a lawyer, art patronage is where Sawhney found her true calling. An avid art collector, she’s been meticulously and obsessively acquiring contemporary South Asian art for over two decades, amassing what has become one of the finest such personal holdings in the country. Shared with her husband the Indian businessman Tarun Sawhney, her New Delhi home is filled with all kinds of art, particularly by women artists such as Zarina Hashmi, Rana Begum, Chiharu Shiota, and Annie Leibovitz.

How did art first enter her life? As a child, she has fond of memories of visiting museums with her grandfather, but it was a trip to the Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia as a young student that proved transformative. ‘When I stepped into the Barnes Foundation for the first time, I realized that even a private art collector could make a difference and leave behind such a huge cultural legacy. That changed my perspective,’ says Sawhney, who sits on the advisory board of the Foundation for Indian Contemporary Art; she is also a trustee of Chennai Photo Biennale and a member of Tate Modern’s South Asian acquisitions committee. Her ultimate dream is to have a positive impact on society through art. Collecting, after all, is more than just a search for beauty and meaning. It is also, she believes, a ‘social responsibility.’