There’s jazz, there’s rock n roll.
There’s sax, there’s violins.
Slipping in slivers of Dixieland stomp, Portuguese Fados,
Ellingtonesque doodles, cha cha cha, Mozart and Bach themes.
There’s Mumbai, Bombay, India.
There’s egos, failed futures, alcoholism
There’s love, passion, bounced cheques.
There’s show-biz, razzmatazz.
And some of the biggest names in popular culture from
C Ramachander to Laxmikant Pyarelal to Shankar Jaikishen to RD Burman.

The twenty-first century is the age of the electronic image. From every corner of our world, electronic images fling themselves at us, entertaining, educating, enticing, offering us a virtual world of global dimensions to immerse ourselves in. The very notion of a private self seems threatened by this onslaught from outside. But suppose the most vociferous of these images were one’s own?

Manjula Nayak is a not very successful Kannada short-story writer…. Suddenly she becomes wealthy and internationally famous by writing a best-seller in English. The question haunting Manjula is whether in thus opting for the global audience she has betrayed her own language and identity. A little-known face in Karnataka, she has now acquired an international image. And inherited problems of loyalty and betrayal. And, without warning, it’s her own image that decides to play confessor, psychologist and inquisitor.

The play opens with Narada – the mythological sage, who is famous for his closeness to the God as well as his habit of playing mischief, Maruti and Ashwatthama, two characters from Indian epics who are immortals. However there is a major difference in their respective immortality – Maruti has got it as a boon while Ashwatthama has got it as a curse. We come to know that they have a custom of meeting after two hundred years and they are meeting now after such a period.

They are in an office of a businessman – Sudhir. They look on at the proceedings with bored detachment. Suddenly there is an accident outside in which a young boy gets injured, but nobody from the office shows any concern. Maruti and Ashwatthama get disturbed at this callousness. Narada informs them that there is no need to get disturbed. He tells them that in 3985 medical science is so developed that there is no natural, accidental or illness death any more. Now the Central Computer allots every newborn child a specific amount of life. Then the child is given free education. The mode of exchange – currency – now is life span. Every adult is supposed to work after education and in return gets more life (in stead of money). All the exchanges happen using the life span instead of money. It is an extreme condition of capitalism. What they see is ruthless competition all round as if one does not earn enough one simply dies – when his/her spending is more than their earning. There is no other death as all the diseases have a cure, all the body parts have replacements – thereby eliminating aging as well.

The duo initially are not interested. But when they see Sudhir, the capitalist behaving very badly and exploitatively they get angry. Narada instigates them into activity by challenging their honour.  He makes them realize that now Maruti and Ashwatthama happen to be the richest people. They have never-ending supply of life i.e. money. He also tells them that this is a good chance for them to get over their eternal boredom. The result is that they get interested and start taking part in the business activities. They start a company – Maruti Ashwatthama and Associates. To start with they are just reckless and do it as a game but slowly they get more and more involved. As they have a never ending supply of life it is very difficult for anybody else to compete with them. What ensues is a ruthless struggle for existence. Sudhir tries to manipulate the central controlling computer, as that is the only way to fight Maruti and Ashwatthama.
The play ends as bizarrely as it starts by the entire human race thrown back by 2000 years – into 1985. Nobody even realizes that they have suddenly been shifted in time and have a new set of memory. The relationship between time and memory, and the limitations of human understanding are revealed to Maruti and Ashwatthama who are dumbfounded at seeing the people around them playing this game of life with as much zeal as ever even under this changed conditions. They are back to where they were but for them everything has changed in this absurd existence – at least for the time being!

Bhagwan is the epitome of the mundane – a middle-aged banker, married, with two grown up college-going children. However, one day, while sitting on a decrepit park bench he stumbles upon ‘enlightenment’. Therein begins the battle between the world outside and his world inside.
First he loses his job. Then his whereabouts are unknown for weeks at length. When he is finally found, his family and friends cannot understand a word of what he says. He has forgotten the speech of everyday use. His dissociation with his previous life continues to grow; as his internal world brings in newer associations. A ‘chacha’ or uncle that only he can see; a dumb-mute beggar whose singing only he can hear. Bhagwan’s journey to ‘the other side’ is as alluring as it is mystifying.

But it is not a ‘knowledge’ that Bhagwan wishes to have. He wants to return to his daughter, his wife and the regularity of his everyday life. Thus begins his fight to ‘return’.
References in the play have been made to the works of Nietzsche, Wittgenstein, Maharshi Raman, U.G.Krishnamurty, Vinod Kumar Shukl, Nirmal Verma, Ram Krishna Paramhans.

The time and space of action is from the 11th day in the Warfield of Mahabharata.

According to the Indian theatre tradition, the play starts with nandi of the Sutradhara which is interrupted by sound echoed from the war. A warrior from Duryodhana calls Karnna to fight for his side, as Bhishma has fallen.

The great warrior Karnna, the son of Soorya is seen disturbed and depressed in the Warfield instead of being mighty and powerful. The play analyses the reasons.

He is worried of his birth, his cast and his social status. Whether he is the son of Kunthi and Soorya, or Radha and Sutha? The mockery and adulation of the society moulds his person and fate. For a while he is moved by the meaninglessness of the war where men kill each other. He says that irrespective of his win or loss, war is a real waste. This vision adds to his turbulence.

Karnna tells Salyar about the curse given by his guru, Parasurama. This episode is enacted by correlating the narration of the present with the enacting of the past. The astra advised by Parasurama is found powerless at the needed hour.

The entry of Indra disguised as a Brahmin follows, who cunningly takes away the divine Kavacha and Kundala from Karnna. He understands that the whole plot is masterminded by the shrewd Krishna and accepts his fate.

In return a messenger from Indra offers a powerful weapon Vimala which can destroy one among the Pandavas. Karnna is not willing to accept a return for his generosity. But the messenger insists ‘-this is the word of a brahmin’ which Karnna ultimately accept.

Accepting the challenge from Arjuna and Krishna the revitalized Karnna proceed to his ultimate fate heroically. Thus ends Bhasa’s play Karnnabharam.

Matra Ratra is an hour long-play produced by Aasakta in Marathi. Aasakta has always experimented with production styles and technique in each play. The play reveals 17 nights in the life of a modern-day young urban couple Nilu and Anju. When Nilu and Anju manage to escape their annoying roommate Radha and get their own flat, the couple is overjoyed. Anju is a working woman and works for a leading boutique in the city whereas Nilu is a playwright without much success.

Appreciating the fact of having a whole new space for making violent and loud sex, Night after night appears a story of romantic, mush filled love. But the story doesn’t fulfil in true sense and they soon find their bliss is short-lived. Articulating and expressing the love for one another they also whine and complain about all possible issues. Added to it, they also bitch about a close friend supposedly the best gossip monger, cheap rumour spreader in the whole wide world. They also fearlessly express their failures and inabilities in their respective lives. To be precise they ride on all petty seeming issues, which for that particular moment is the most important thing to be addressed and come on cue to say ‘I LOVE YOU’ most passionately. They don’t just restrict to saying this but physically indulge in intense love making. Coming together till reasons lighter than feathers pull them apart, yelling and cursing each other finally crusading to the cue to say how much they love each other. On one single bed, night after night cuddling in each others arms, finally the questions start popping.

This light veined play examines the age-old questions couples must face every day: Is it better to tell love stories to each other, or just watch TV? Should men be forced to go for shopping? Should the fan be on even though it makes an annoying sound? Does love really exists or is it just a big reasonable nonsense?

Rajkumar Hemendrajit, is very unhappy by the untimely death of his father after which his mother Garima Devi married his uncle Kalhans. One night on seeing his father’s ghost accusing Kalhans of murder, Rajkumar decides on revenge.

In order to prove his uncle’s guilt Rajkumar arranges a theatre performance which re enacts the events of the murder and invites the king and the queen. All of a sudden, King Kalhans stops the play performance of the murder of Gajendra.

In Queen Garima Devi’s chamber, mistaking Prabalbachan (Kalhans’s Prime minister) for the king, Rajkumar kills him and is then exiled to Ishanpeeth.  Rajkumar escapes & returns to Parbatpur.

Kalhans plans a fencing match between Rajkumar Hemendrajit & Lakshyajit, Prabalbachans son. Out to avenge his father’s death, Lakshyajit takes a poisoned sword for the match.  King Kalhans offers a glass of poisoned wine to Rajkumar but he refuses it, instead Queen Garima Devi drinks it and dies. Lakshyajit, who is struck by his own sword during the bout, reveals the king’s plot. Rajkumar stabs his uncle with the poisoned sword. Lakshyajit & Hemendrajit forgive each before succumbing to their injuries. Before his death Rajkumar Hemendrajit declares Rajkumar Narottam, the prince of Naurangapur as the future king of Parbatpur.

Ishara’s puppet and dance version is based on Rashna Imhasly’s book “The Psychology of Love – Wisdom of Indian Mythology” where she has used both the versions from the Vetalapanchcavinasati and Thomas Mann’s “Transposed heads” continuation, as representative stories depicting the illusions of love. It deals with the duality of each person, between illusion and reality with stylized puppet archetypes and dancers, to a score composed and compiled by Sawan Dutta.

It’s a non-verbal -no text performance- to music with some narration in-between -poems and sayings from various poets including Rumi, Thomas Mann and others. “Transposition” features three large puppets and dancers with projections and a dramatic recorded music score with chants.

THE STORY

The story seeks a synthesis between the world and the spirit, between life and death. It’s about the understanding and insight of the human heart. How can one arrive at a perception of peace and feel the joy of cessation from conflict unless one has the Maya-image (illusionary image) to give one an understanding of it? Nanda and Shridaman two friends are bound together by their unlikeness of each other. Both love the beautiful Sita, who is married off to Shridaman, but Sita eventually longs for what she hasn’t – Nanda. The two males temporarily loose their heads in a fit of confusion and anger only to be put together by Sita, Her confusion results in the switching of heads in relation to the bodies. Now who is the real husband?

The three need one or the other to feel their sense of completion, short sightedness symbolizes states of incompleteness in ourselves, which we project onto our relationships; each imprisons the other and in trying to break loose we are chained. Loves disappointments lead us to interiorising and self-reflection. Maturity ripens by recognizing our own excesses, betrayals and failures. Each needs to turn the sword against their present division within themselves. Only when mind and the body are one are we part of the universal order of things.

Rashna Imhasly-Gandhy is a transpersonal psychologist and the author of the book “The psychology of Love – Wisdom of Indian Mythology.” Married to a Swiss National she lived in Switzerland for seventeen years where she studied Jungian psychology. She lives and has a private practice in New Delhi, India besides working with groups in conflict areas in Kashmir and Gujarat. She teaches and lectures in Switzerland, Germany, Holland and Mexico.

Play based on famous story ‘Maanabhanjan’, by Tagore. Play talks about a young girl Giribala who is in bliss of marital pleasures. All of a sudden  a death of her father in law gives an ample money and power to her husband Gopinath.

Gopinath enjoys the new position of a leader amongst his peers. And slowly starts drifting away from his wife Giribala to a new found love i.e. THEATRE.

To locate her husband, Giribala visits theatre and get charmed by the magic of  dance, music and acting by lead actress, Lavanga Jaan.

Lavanga creates a storm in Giribala and Gopinaths relationship. Gopinath wants to establish his ownership on Lavangas talent. Giribala wants to show her defiance but to no avail.

Gopinath abducts Lavanga. There is a crisis in theatre, which provides a opportunity to Giribala to prove her point.

Its an amalgamation of thetre, dance and music. 

Amrit Kent’s original play ‘Rumi: Unveil the Sun’ celebrates UNESCO’s Year of Mevlana Rumi, 2007. It brings to stage the astonishing encounter between Mevlana Jalaluddin Rumi and the wandering dervish Shamsuddin Tabrizi in 13th century Turkey that turned Rumi into one of the greatest Sufi mystics of all time. Rumi’s Mathnawi, an oceanic, didactic work, charts the inner and outer journey of a mystic.