Dilip Guha New Delhi: Prarambh, a noted theatre group in Delhi, staged a full-length Bengali play, “Chup! Adalat Cholchey” (Silence! The Court is in Session) directed by Rabishankar Kar at the capital’s Muktodhara Auditorium.
The play was originally written in the Marathi language titled “Shantata! Court Chalu Ahe.” by well-known Indian playwright, Vijay Tendulkar in 1963 and translated into Bangla by Smt Shukla Basu (Sen). The story of the play revolves around the theme of gender discrimination and the courtier system of India.
All the characters of the play come to a small village to perform a play. In the absence of a character, it is decided that Samant, one of the villagers will play that role. The plot of the play takes place in an evening and it is set in an old community hall of a village. The hall is used by the villagers to conduct their social and cultural activities. Samant is a local person from the village and an important element of the play who keeps the play moving. It is for him the mock trial is staged as he is unaware of the court proceedings thus this has a play within a play.
The central character of the play is Leela Benare, the protagonist of the play. She is a teacher by profession and keeps her professional and personal life separate. She is full of life and courageous too. She is an independent and progressive woman who does not care about social norms and customs.
The play is meaningfully devised against her. In this mock trial, she is accused of infanticide. All the characters stand against her and she stands alone on the other side. The play gradually reveals the reality and it turns out that she is pregnant but she is unmarried. She is a victim of a patriarchal society that looks at women as an object of lust. At the age of fifteen her uncle sexually exploited her and later she was harassed by a married man who left her pregnant and disowned responsibility. As a result of this, she no longer believes in men and resolves to give birth to her child. The child is illegal in the eyes of the society. Thus, all the characters of the play torture her for the illegal act and sentenced her to undertake an abortion.
In terms of performance in the play, the young cast Ms. Leela Benare, led by an effortless Sristi Das, tried hard to etch life-like portrayals and managed to pull it through as she shows her moral courage by publicly accepting her ‘mistakes’ and effectively focused on the assigned role.
Samanth another cast played by Prabir Dhar effectively the role of a rustic uneducated villager in a galaxy of educated urban characters. Palash Das, a well-known name in Delhi’s theatre circle played the character role of Mr. Kashikar, the judge in the mock trial in the play. He is effectively a disgruntled sadist figure like other men in the play except for Samanth.
Mrs. Kashikar who represents a typical Indian housewife dependent on her husband for everything played by Nivedita Sirkar. Other supporting performers namely Sushata Sinha As Balu Rokre, Subhash Chakraborty as Pongshe, Sheshadri Mitra As Sukhatme, Kunal Mukherjee As Karnik, Sushanta Chakraborty, and Pooja Kumari as Crowd does well.
Talking to Rabishankar Kar, a renowned theatre artist and director of the capital, who has been trying to reinvent the stage as an art space since 1998, said that “plays of Vijay Tendulkar are based on real incidents which throw light upon various aspects of our society and this play is a realistic approach to understanding the human psyche. In other words, the playwriter tries to say that no one character is completely good or bad”.
Talking about the significance of the title of the play he said “There is no silence or discipline in the court, and even the wife of the judge Mrs. Kashikar disturbs the court all the time. When Benare wants to protest she is ordered to be silent because the court is in session. Again when she keeps silent she is ordered to break the silence in the name of law and threatened with contempt of court. In such a grim scenario, every word of the title Chup! Adalat Cholchey assumes symbolic significance. The word “Silence’ symbolizes the patriarchal conspiracy to silence the voice of a woman in the name of social justice and ideology. And therefore, the title is appropriate for the play.”
Besides direction, Sudip Biswas designs the set Ranjan Basu lighting, and Soma Kar scores the music execution with competence. The hilarious as well as the tense moments were handled well. Soma Kar also does the Makeup & costume.