Drama fest brings out the best in Punjabi theatre

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This time the Punjabi Academy’s annual drama festival was not competitive and hence two of the stalwarts of Punjabi theatre also participated. Neelam Man Singh Chowdhury came with Tagore’s story, A Wife’s Letter, adapted into Punjabi by the poet Surjit Patar.

The protagonist, played by Ramanjit Kaur, is Mrinal, the beautiful bride who secretly writes poetry to assuage her routine and mundane life. Into her monotonous life enters the child, Bindu, the orphaned sister of her sister-in-law. In a novel experiment, we have two Mrinals, one is Ramanjit, who carries the narrative forward as she types the letter, getting up occasionally to complete her daily chores through the miniature sets that surround her. She is superb as she mimics handling the dairy animals.
The other is a young boy (Vansh Bharadwaj is evocative in the role) who participates in the physical action. Neelam visualises the relationship between Mrinal and Bindu as one that is “beautiful and haunting” as well as “fraught with ambiguities.”
Are Mrinal and Bindu mother and daughter? Or is Mrinal living out her lost childhood through Bindu or does she represent her lost child? ‘Is Mrinal’s unresolved self seeking sustenance through a younger companion? ‘The relationship is probably a combination of all these feelings. A sensitive mind can conceive and hold all these emotions in a single body. It is after Neelam’s production, which also personalises Bindu as a character played by a much older actor, Gick Grewal, that the of essence of woman’s brave rejection of a stable existence for a unknown future is brought to life. It is reminiscent of Ibsen’s Doll’s House, when the heroine slams the door on her past, her husband and children and sets out to face an uncertain future.
Dr Atmajit, an awardee by the Sahitya Academy and the Sangeet Natak Academy, is both a writer and a dramatist who has a philosophy of life and theatre. He is concerned with the web of personal/artistic/social relationships that constitute the material of his dramatic content and structures. He is interested in exploring those subliminal, psychological depths of human behaviour that define or defy the limits of human understanding.
The play, Panch Nadi Da Pani, written an directed by Atmajit, is based on two short stories by Manmohan Bawa. It is set in 13th century Punjab and depicts the time when the Mughals were attacking Punjab which was defended by the Turks and the local Rajput rulers were reduced to mere spectators. An honourable proposal is made by Ghazi Mallik, the governor of Punjab, (who later ruled India as Gyasuddin Tughlaq) for the hand of Naila, the daughter of Rana Rajmal Bhatti, for his younger brother Rajab Ali. But Ranmal Bhatti, led on by his priest, rejects the idea outright. Nalia takes the matter in her own hands and meets Rajab Ali with a challenge; she will marry him if he gets the head of the Mughal who kidnapped her elder sister and named her Dulari. The feminist angle is strong in the play with Naila finally marrying her Rajab for the love and respect they share mutually. The other aspect refers secularism. The Shudra, Birju, thrown out of the palace by the priest, becomes a Muslim, rises in the Army and becomes important enough to rescue Naila’s elder sister Dulari from the Mughals and make her his own.
Another interesting romantic proposal is Dalpat, who is in love with Naila and stays with her till we see her at ninety. Finally, when she asks what he wants, he replies, to figure in your dreams of love.
What however holds the play together are the two sutradhars who are maskaras from the folk tradition. They deliver wisdom as satirical fun. Tullabhand is brilliantly enacted by Sangeeta Gupta whose comic timing is fantastic. Her companion is Thullabhand, played efficiently by Raman Dhillon. The musical chorus sang harmoniously to usher in different sequences.
The play is both lyrical and dramatic in its language. Its approach to characterisation is unusual in its layered treatment. Naila is particularly complex in its double loyalty to her father and to her Muslim lover. The scene between her and Rajab Ali was one of the highlights of a theme that is concerned with the woman’s freedom of choice. The other problem the play tackles is of secularism which is brilliantly done in the encounter of the maskaras and the priest.
Dr C.D. Siddhu’s new play, Mangoo Te Bikkar, picks up the theme of a friendship between two old men who cannot live without each other nor can they live with each other. Ninety-year old Bikkar is unmarried living with his nephew, who is a 75-year-old widower.
They live in the village on Mangoo’s land while his three children live in the city. The children are summoned when Mangoo fractures his leg and cannot get up from his bed.
The eldest son, who left for America to study and get married to a woman who has now left him with their two children, returns to the village to try his luck with the girl he left behind. The daughter, who lives in a city close by comes with the hope of living off the land that belongs to Mangoo.
The second son and his wife are willing to take the father with them but without Bikkar. They also have two daughters they hope to marry off cheaply in the village.
In the meanwhile, the two old men are quarrelling all the time with Mangoo cursing Bikkar for being a burden for him.
In response to which Bikkar pretends to run away only to return when food has been arranged for them either by a student of Mangoo, who was the headmaster of the village school, or by one of the other village folk.
In the end, the children get together and decide that the land and farm must be sold even as they fight amongst themselves over who will keep Mangoo.
In the only scene where Ravi Taneja, the actor playing Mangoo, gets out of bed is when he decides he has had enough and limps up to Bikkar and assures him that he will never leave him or the village. That they will die here together.
This life and friendship affirming play has wonderful dialogues , and is one of Dr Siddhu’s best plays both on terms of characterisation and structure. This was director Ravi Taneja’s best performance too date. His Mangoo came to life with Rishi Raj Sharma’s Bikkar.
Execept for Ramesh Khanna who was over the top as Nishan Singh, the rest of the cast played effectively within the parameters of their characters.