Through a narrative arc that tracks the life of a war widow’s son who enlists as an Air Force pilot, and later faces a court martial and is interned for defying the official narrative about civilian casualties during an operation in Sri Lanka, Indianostrum’s play Flying Chariot(s), at its core, deals with the consequences of truth-telling in this day and age.
The play which often references the Mahabharatha even takes its title after the chariot of Yudhishtira — the wheels would not touch the ground so long as he remains the epitome of truth and virtue, whose half-truth would swing the war in favour of the Pandavas.
Yudhishtira’s proclamation of the fall of “Aswathama” to mislead Drona into believing it to be about his son (and not the war elephant killed by Bhima) is one of the stories that the mother narrates to her child, who dreams to fly one day.
“Can I fly if I speak the truth?”, a wonder-eyed Ajay (Abhay Mahajan) asks his mother, Sheetal (Anjana Balaji). “Yes”, she replies, “but only if you speak the truth”.
Sheetal, who had lost her husband in war, is against the idea of her son joining the force.
So, she is unhappy over his long absences on missions, petrified when he announces that his next assignment is in Sri Lanka, and incredulous when told that he had actually volunteered for it. “This is just a peacekeeping role,” he seeks to reassure her.
Scenes of Ajay’s joyous childhood are interspersed with that of the court room trial where the man claims in vain that the civilians were killed in a bombing raid and not in crossfire. Eventually, the accused, whose signs of post-traumatic stress disorder are equated with symptoms of an unsound mind, is pronounced guilty of breaching the code of conduct and gross indiscipline.
An important period of the play involves Ajay’s period of confinement in a cell with an off-balance roommate with a phobia for black umbrellas.
For months, his delusional mate wakes up with excitement of going home every morning only to climb back between the sheets when the routine is shattered by the prison guard who feigns to help by offering a black umbrella as shield from an imaginary downpour outside.
Ajay’s trauma turns him into a pale shadow of the winsome young man he once was.
The audience’s thoughts are directed to how it all began, the uneasy relation between war and truth, and how all conflicts seem to share the same climax — of loss, pain and suffering.
And, they lead to the stories typically told to children, speaking of heroes who are capable of always being right, courageous and truthful.
In the denouement, Ajay is one of those children who likes to believe in these stories, especially the story of King Yudhishtira (Dharmaraja) and his flying chariot. But, there comes a time in people’s lives, when realisation dawns that these are just to be consigned to the realm of stories.
“Beyond the culture of idolatry around the heroes in the Mahabharatha , there has not been any assimilation of the ethics and values embodied in the epic in society,” says Koumarane Valavane, director of Flying Chariot(s) .
“In real life, truth is a mirage-like ideal,” he said.
The cast also includes Dharanidharan U. and Vasanth Selvam. Arjun Chandran has scored the music.
