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When democracy founders

Powerful A scene from “Bhookey Navik”.

The Hindi version of Vrindavan Dandvate’s “Bhookhey Navik”, which was presented by Mask at Poorva Sanskritik Kendra this past week, is a biting satire on the ruling classes who distort and debase such noble concepts as democracy, s elf-sacrifice and generosity to achieve their nefarious ends. A political parable, the play cautions the exploited to be vigilant and united to defeat the designs of the exploiter.

The work was translated into Hindi by Bhanu Bharti and Uttara Baokar from the original Marathi for the diploma production by Kirti Jain when she was a student of the National School of Drama nearly three decades ago. This play assumes an important place in the repertoire of Mask which presented it for the first time in December 2002 to mark the death anniversary of Panchanan Pathak, a theatre veteran and an innovator of Indian theatre music, at LTG auditorium. The late Pathak, an Indian People’s Theatre Association activist, had great fascination for this play and had staged it several times under the banner of Vidhushak.

The play has been directed by Dinesh Ahlawat, a Shri Ram Centre Acting Course pass out. He was associated with Pathak and Vidhushak. To perpetuate Pathak’s progressive theatrical legacy, Dinesh frequently revives this play, mostly with a new cast.

The entire action takes place in a wrecked ship. There are only three survivors who belong to different social strata. There is nothing to eat; they are on the verge of starvation. The only way out that appears to them is to kill one of the occupants of the devastated ship and eat his flesh.

The polemics centre on who should ‘sacrifice’ himself to allow his fellow sailors to survive. To select the victim, various methods such as voting, contesting elections and the right to propagate ones ideas before the ‘electorate’ are played out. All these modes of civil society are degenerated into farce by the strongest among the three who preaches ethical precepts of self-sacrifice for the sake of others. By despotic methods, falsehood and disdainfully mocking at civilised norms of the society, the powerful one forces the weakest sailor to submit to the principle of “supreme sacrifice voluntarily”.

Two characters — a postman and a cook — manage to enter the scene of action by sailing across the water.

Their interactions with the beleaguered sailors contribute to impart insights into the characterisations, exposing the falsehood resorted to by the strongest sailor.

The sets are not appropriate to create the right ambience for the dramatic action. We get the impression that the action is taking place in a drawing room instead of in a wrecked ship in the midst of water. Director Dinesh has added a song which is used when a flashback scene is enacted in the midst of the audience with the weakest sailor and his ailing mother making an unsuccessful effort to sell painting to a world deaf to human suffering.

Because of the length of the sequence it tends to drag and shift our focus from the grim and inhuman action on the stage, projecting sailors’ morbid desire to become cannibals as a way of survival.

Prasunn as the overbearing and physically strong sailor who conceals his ruling class background with a view to present him as a poor orphan and Arjun Rawat as the middle sailor, who forms an opportunistic alliance with the strongest sailor, act admirably.

Saurabh Vaishya as the weakest sailor brings vividly alive the fear, anxiety and the desperation of his character. His sailor wins the sympathy and admiration of the audience for his triumph over his brute and formidable enemies.

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