Plays Focusing on Dissent and Discourse, Part of Ongoing Show, Based on the Works of the Late Rebel Artist BM Anand

KOCHI:
Strong crowds thronged a number of locations around Fort Kochi and Mattancherry today as the BM Anand Foundation along with Jana Natya Manch (Janam), one of Delhi’s oldest and most non-conformist theatre groups, kicked off a weekend-long series of street theatre performances.
After watching The Faces of Violence (Yeh Bhi Hinsa Hai), a production based on physical and non-physical acts of violence committed against women, Shruthi and Payoshni had their eyes well up with tears. Many of the 200 strong gathered for the performance, had similar reactions to the play, which ends with a symbolic – but powerful – depiction of rape.
“The troupe visualised daily life incidents,” Shruthi said. “I could not control my emotions on viewing the pain they expressed. The play dealt with various shades of male dominance – from stalking and voyeurism to patriarchy.”
“The play eloquently expressed the sexual and mental abuse a woman has to face from childhood. What I like most about the play is the direct approach they used to tell harsh realities,” Payoshni said.
That first of four shows held through the day at the Mattancherry bus stand, Vasco da Gama Square, Fort Kochi beach and Aspinwall House, set the tone for the performances, organised as part of the outreach programme of the exhibition titled, Dissent & Discourse: the Art and Politics of Brij Mohan Anand, running as a collateral project of the Kochi-Muziris Biennale, at the Greenix Village Cultural Arts Centre in Fort Kochi.
“The exhibition, a sampling of the estimated 1,500 surviving works by Brij Mohan Anand, offers a social and cultural critique of Third World revolution and the culture of imperialism. At a time when independent, radical thought found few outlets for expression, B.M. Anand’s works reflected the modern industrial world and served to hold the empowered perspective, and the selective interests served by it, accountable to the broader public. The series of plays by the revolutionary street group Jana Natya Manch on the exploitation of industrial labour and gender violence resonates strongly with the philosophy of this Indian Modern Mas
ter,” said the exhibition’s curator Shruthi Issac.
The two plays, intended to spark a conversation on the many faces of dissent and its significance in public discourse, creativity and progress, will also be performed tomorrow at locations in Fort Kochi and Mattancherry as well as Marine Drive and Subhash Park in the city.
“The women of the current generation are reluctant to open up about the mental and physical trauma faced in a patriarchal society. Street plays like this should be organised at the school-level to allow future generations to overcome this fear and to create awareness,” said Cochin Corporation Councillor, Shiny Mathew, who attended one of the performances of The Faces of Violence
A second play, Enough is Enough (Yeh Hum Kyun Sahein), based on real testimonies collected by Janam from industrial workers in and around Delhi – also played to appreciative audiences. The production highlights the mechanics of how workers are exploited and the issues that confront them such as low wages, long work hours and inadequate safety measures. The play juxtaposes hilarious over-the-top farce with deadly serious, quietly assertive drama on the harsh work conditions faced by the workers.
“It was a pleasure to see so many people gathered for the street plays even though the medium of the shows was Hindi,” said Moloyashree Hashmi, wife of Safdar Hashmi, the founder of Jana Natya Manch and one of the six actors in the troupe. “We have witnessed people crying, getting angry and flaring up during our performances, but to see a crowd completely buying into our conceptions was a satisfying experience,” she added.
The other actors in the cast are Ashok Tiwari, Sudhanva Deshpande, Soman T.K., Joyoti Roy and Komita Dhanda.
“The BM Anand Foundation’s project and exhibition in Kochi is focused on starting a conversation around the many faces of dissent and its significance in public discourse, creativity and progress. This is particularly relevant today when there is a debate over the need to accommodate dissent within Indian art and politics”, said Aditi Anand, Associate Director of the BM Anand Foundation and co-author of Narratives for Indian Modernity: The Aesthetic of Brij Mohan Anand, a book based on the life and work of the artist.
“The Foundation intends to take this conversation to the person on the street through it’s collaboration with Jan Natya Manch, a pioneer of the street theatre movement, known for it’s use of innovative performance in drawing people into conversations around issues of social and national importance,” she added.