Rising from the dead

The characters in “Yamlok Ki Chahal Pahal”, staged in New Delhi recently, were sketchy though its stage design was certainly imaginative.

July 24, 2014 04:49 pm | Updated 04:49 pm IST - New Delhi

A scene from Yamlok Ki Chahal Pahal

A scene from Yamlok Ki Chahal Pahal

In recent years, we have witnessed plays on the Delhi stage depicting the last journey of mortals to confront messengers of Yama to confess their sins committed by them on the earth. This device is generally used to comment on the prevailing social and economic injustice and the nefarious acts of politicians in power. The most popular play of this genre is the Hindi version of Satish Alekar’s “Mahanirvan”. A black comedy, the play explores the mockery of human relationships and hypocrisy of society through the eye of the soul of a dead man. Another play is “Democracy In Heaven”, a dramatisation of Shankar Puntambekar’s novel “Ek Mantri Swarglok Main” by Suman Kumar. It is a satire on the insatiable desire for privileges by political class even on the heaven after death. One of the critically acclaimed plays on this theme is “Jamlog” by renowned Rajasthani poet, critic and playwright Arjun Deo Charan. We have one more play of this kind titled “Yamlok Ki Chahal Pahal” which was presented by Wings Cultural Society at New Delhi’s Shri Ram Centre this past week. Presented to a capacity hall, the play provides some light-hearted moments by unmasking the hypocritical past lives of its characters.

Wings Cultural Society is one of the few amateur groups in the Capital which emerged as a significant group to produce plays socially relevant and artistically impressive. Its productions have featured at the prestigious National and State festivals, especially its “Chand Roz Aur Meri Jaan” under the direction of veteran stage artist Salima Raza featured at the Bharat Rang Mahotsav and invited by Faiz Ghar to perform at Alhamra Hall-II, Lahore, Pakistan. Compared with its previous productions, the play under review tends to be slight. The theme is relevant and the intensions of the group are good but dramatically, it is not effective enough to create tense situations to provide deep insights into social malaise it intends to expose.

Written by D.P. Singh and jointly directed by the playwright and Tarique Hameed, the play opens with a messenger leading the soul of a dead man to the court of Yama to receive the final judgment about his fate whether he is destined to go to heaven or he will be condemned to live in hell. The soul is that of a dead lawyer. The messenger leaves him in sprawling space crowded with the souls of dead people. All these souls keep on strolling impatiently, uncertain about their fate because Yama has his own yardstick to judge the moral conduct of humans. The soul of the lawyer confronts with the soul of a judge. In bitterness, they both are engaged in exposing each other. Without exploring their confrontations in depth, the play moves to depict one confrontation after another in a superficial manner. On surface, we watch glimpses of the interactions of the souls of antagonistic mortals. We watch the revelations of a bureaucrat, income tax officer, doctor and magistrate, reflecting their arrogance and absence of fairness. Here are souls of the people who are the victims of the people in power. A self-styled god man meets a simple soul who was credulous enough to believe in the teachings of the god man. This naïve and simple common man is given the elevated position of the messenger of the Yama while the god man is being punished for his fraudulent practice to exploit religious faith of the common man and amass wealth.

The playwright tries to project dramatis personae from different social strata. There is hardly any dramatic action. The characters keep on moving without any motive. Interestingly, the playwright is a lawyer by profession, whose main focus is on the character of the lawyer in brief conversation with different characters, especially judge, magistrate and innocent people who are the victims of prevailing system.

In this hour of judgment, the assembled cursed souls pray to god, beseeching His forgiveness for their sins. The god gives them another chance to have another life on the earth to redeem themselves. Now, in their new life, they will go through all the sufferings their victims have suffered in their earlier life.

However, the play’s saving grace is imaginative design. The offstage rendering of Kumar Gandharv’s lyric “Ud Jaayega Hans Akela” and the subtle lighting design by Raghav Mishra contribute to create an ambience to evoke surrealistic mood. Similarly, the apt use of huge pieces of white fabric reinforced the surrealistic atmosphere of the production. Similarly, the use of upstage for exit makes viewing effective.

The characters are conceived sketchily. Most of the performers have nothing to do except move to different areas of the stage in lose flowing costumes in harmony with the broad mood of the production. The main focus is on the character of lawyer which is played by D.P. Singh who engages the attention of the audience with his comic comments on lawyers.

0 / 0
Sign in to unlock member-only benefits!
  • Access 10 free stories every month
  • Save stories to read later
  • Access to comment on every story
  • Sign-up/manage your newsletter subscriptions with a single click
  • Get notified by email for early access to discounts & offers on our products
Sign in

Comments

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.