The ‘Rohingya’ Crisis, Colonialism and the North East

The Shillong Times

By PUBLIC ON 9 DEC 2017

SPECIAL ARTICLE

The ‘Rohingya’ Crisis, Colonialism and the North East

By Jyotirmoy Prodhani

            The Rohingya issue, where image dissemination in various platforms including electronic and social media has played a major role, is no doubt a massive humanitarian crisis. Bangladesh has given an official count of about 600,000 Rohingyas being taken in and presently clueless as to how to handle them. If the newspaper articles of Bangladesh are to be believed, considerable amount of resentment is brewing up in the country following such large scale influx into their territory; they even accused the ‘Rohingyas’ of having destroyed huge areas of forest land, leveled miles of hills and felling scores trees in a matter of weeks. In fact, the pressure is so acute that many indigenous people in the region are reported to have been turned homeless. Syed Badrul Ahsan in his article in the Indian Express writes, “Rohingya…has emerged as a new class of Islamist militants hostile to the growth of liberal politics in the country.” Quite curiously, with the bait of Nobel Peace Prize dangling from some dubious quarters, Sheikh Hasina is on a queer mat who might as well be dumped by the West if she fails to toe their line. 

            The‘Rohingya’ question, however, has a peculiar historical connection with Assam, vis a vis the North East. It is through the Yandaboo treaty of 1826 following the first Anglo Burmese war that both Assam and Burma became part of the British colonial rule. The British intervention brought an end to the atrocities of the Maans (Burmese) in Assam but at the same time Assam also lost its sovereignty. Similarly, Burma too became part of the British colony and consequently both in Assam and Burma (especially in the Arakan region)scores of landless farmers from East Bengal were implanted by the British to exploit and plunder the vast stretch of lands. However, unlike Assam, the Arakan region had sizeable presence of Bengali Muslims prior to colonization but after colonization in 1826 the population of the East Bengal settlers increased with such ferocious speed that, as written by Derek Tonkin, “By the time of the 1931 Census “Chittagongian” immigrants outnumbered indigenous Muslim residents of Arakan by at least four to one.” This is also the time when the native Arakanese Buddhists were steadily pushed to the periphery by these settlers. This was the fallout of one of the most vicious colonial crimes.

            The overwhelming presence of the Chittagongian settlers led to social anxiety, which became more pronounced when the immigrants made the sinister moves of turning the occupied Arakanese territory into a hard core Islamic state by driving out the native Buddhists from their own homeland. The British had armed the East Bengal immigrants of Arakan to fight the Japanese during the World War II. But the East Bengal immigrants in 1942 had, instead of resisting the Japanese,massacred more than 20,000 native Rakhine Buddhists with those weapons in places like Maungdaw where 214 Rakhine Buddhist villages were wiped out, which was also so far one of the biggest massacres of indigenous people by immigrants in the history of the twentieth century South Asia. Being emboldened by this successful massacre of the natives, these settlers campaigned to make Arakan a part of Pakistan after Burma got independence in 1948.  However, Jinnah was not keen to meddle with Burma.

            The Rakhine people, also known as Mog, some of who are there as native tribes in Tripura and other parts of the North East, are the original inhabitants of Arakan who have been there since time immemorial, at least since 3525 BCE, from the time of their King, Marayu and earlier. Lord Buddha is believed to have gone to their territory in person in 326 BCE to spread His message and since then Arakan had become a major seat of Theravada Buddhism. The native Rakhines consider themselves as being repressed by the majority Burmese on the one hand and the immigrant East Bengal settlers on the other who have successfully outnumbered the Rakhine people in Northern Arakan. Nevertheless, the Bengali Muslims of Arakan who had settled early were very much a part of Burma who even had elected members to the first Constituent Assembly in independent Burma.

            The origin of the term Rohingya is rather vague. The Arakan settlers began to call themselves Rohingyas mainly since 1982. Derek Tonkin in one of his essays revealed that it was Dr. Francis Buchanan who had used the word “Rossawn” in 1799 in an article published from Calcutta.After this, he writes, “Throughout the remainder of his life, Buchanan, who was a prolific writer and gazetteer, never used the word “Rooinga” again.” (26 May 2016). However, the East Bengal origin settlers of Arakan now prefer to call themselves as “Rohingyas” with the objective of claiming indigeneity, though their claims of indigeneity would be as much intriguing and problematic as it is to call the White Americans as indigenous over the American Indians or the White Australians and the White New Zealanders as indigenous over the Australian aboriginals and the Maoris respectively. Quite curiously, in order to deny their East Bengal origin the “Rohingyas” even claimed to have originated from Saudi Arabia. Rodion Ebdighausen significantly points out that the term “Rohingya” is a ‘highly politicized one’ which, he writes, “media, activists and politicians use to take a political stance.”The native Myanmarese, therefore, contest the term “Rohingya” as they consider it a tactical term used by the East Bengal origin Arakan settlers to camouflage themselves as indigenous to Myanmar.

            Nevertheless, there have been East Bengal Muslims in Arakan from the medieval period whom even the Junta government had accepted as citizens including the ones who were brought in hordes by the British colonizers till independence, though the Myanmar government has not been ready to accept the immigrants who had infiltrated the Arakan province after 1948. Despite their claims, quite significantly, the oral history, folklore, folk songs etc. of the “Rohingyas” reflect their deep and indelible linkages with the culture, history and language of East Bengal/ Pakistan. In fact, the New York based Burmese author, HlaOo, writes, “(When) I went back to Maungdaw I needed a Bengali interpreter to shop… it is completely unthinkable to recognize them as an indigenous ethnic group of our Burma.” The popular “Rohingya” folk singer, Muhammad Soufa in one of his pensive songs narrates the tale of their “suffering after migrating to an alien land chasing false dreams and greed for wealth without heeding the words of the Almighty” (Rohingya jatina bujilam keella o bujmon/ ….Janambhor ailam choli misa jutha kotha fandi re/…. Dhonsom pottir lubhe pori/ Bhuillar asool erto rika re). 

            The recent activities, especially in Assam by some Islamist organizations campaigning for the ‘Rohingyas’ to settle them in Assam and in some other parts of the North East, keeping in mind Tripura and places like South Garo Hills in Meghalaya etc., is ominous for it might lead to new social and demographic anxiety, besides North East has never been involved or responsible for the Arakan mess. 

            In fact, Myanmar should take back all the Rakhine refugees who are found to be genuine citizens of the country. Despite having their origin in that country Bangladesh may not be able to take the burden of such a huge number of additional people. The hypocrisy of the West and the oil rich Islamic countries is rather appalling. Instead of pontificating, threatening and bullying a poor and fledgling democracy like Myanmar as well as demonizing one of South Asia’s greatest icons of Democracy, Aung Sang Suu Kyi, they should make their position clear as to whether they would at all accommodate any of the displaced refugees in their own lands. In this context the West has just extended their colonial attitude. Quite intriguingly none of these exorbitantly rich and wealthy countries with high voltage moral rhetoric have opened their borders to officially allow a single hapless person in, which is, arguably, the biggest shame. Hopefully, the world will also wake up to the plight of the indigenous tribes of Arakan, who have fled their homes in Myanmar and are now seeking shelter in Mizoram.

http://www.theshillongtimes.com/2017/12/09/the-rohingya-crisis-colonialism-and-the-north-east/

The Cow is a Four Footed Domestic Animal

       The Shillong Times

                                  ESTABLISHED 1945

JUN 14, 2017

The Cow is a Four Footed Domestic Animal

by Jyotirmoy Prodhani

         The first English essay we learnt in school was on the cow. The next one was, “My Aim in Life”, where the official aim of most students was to become a humble school teacher.  For decades the essay on the cow has remained the same. It begins with that famous line, “The cow is a four footed domestic animal”, considered the perfect opening of a great essay. Later, few of us who had opted for Hindi as an additional subject (it was never compulsory), got to read an abridged version of Premchand’s Godan. Till then we had no idea that the cow could ever occupy centre stage with such formidable stride.

         In Assam there are special rituals in the form of Garu (cow) Bihu during Rongali and Bhogali Bihu. One is not aware as to whether in the Hindi heartland, also known as the cow belt, there are any such folk rituals and privileges reserved for the cow despite having the most violent cow protectors (gau rakshaks) thriving in those territories. The idea of goushala has primarily come from the cow belt where in most cases the cows experience what it feels to be in the worst form of hell, to the extent that people had to file PIL suits seeking judicial intervention to improve their condition. Though goushalasare most likely to become premium national institutes soon, yet one can well anticipate that putrid squalid of these enclosures is least likely to disappear. Ironically, no matter how much they officially claim the cow to be their mata, as soon as it is dead, it quickly transforms into horrible dirt, a filthy untouchable. To deal with the dead cows the great protectors and worshippers of cow go to the extent of inventing a whole new caste with similar status- the Untouchables.

         By the way, how long does the cow remain a ‘national animal’ – as long as she is alive or even after her death? In that case, will the carcasses of cows ever be offered pujan by the Brahmins? Will they pull the tail of a dead cow to dab it on their foreheads as it is normally done with dead elephants? One never knows. With the growing clout of the cow, we might soon discover skin and dry bones of dead cows adorning households in the manner that tiger skin and deer trophies did earlier on the walls of the rich and mighty. In that case  the untouchables, exploited for centuries in the name of the cow, might be relieved of the customary obligation to handle the cow carcasses; the high castes might as well take over the job now. It seems utopian though because hypocrisy is expected to remain as intact.           

            When the present union government is so sentimental about the cow, it should also be equally concerned about the most abusive methods used to extract its milk. In fact, it is the cow which is the only animal on this planet that cannot feed its milk to its own calves properly. Every drop of milk extracted from her is by cruelly depriving a young and hungry calf of its right to the mother’s udder. Commercial production of milk products is the biggest cause of the awful exploitation of the cows. Ghee is one such mass milk product, which is considered a health hazard and one of the biggest causes of endemic obesity, alarming rise of diabetes, heart attacks, pressure and a host of other ailments. To begin with, at least in the North Eastern states where ghee is not the primary form of edible oil, it should be banned on ethical grounds. This would greatly reduce the mental and physical agony of the cow. By forcing cows to produce more milk for commercial gains, at times by  injecting poisonous diclofenac, the perpetrators are not only inflicting immoral harm to the souls of the cow but also to not less than ‘thirty three crores of celestial souls’ who supposedly live inside her. Other major milk products like paneer etc. should also follow suit on the same ethical grounds. This would be a genuine tribute to the beleaguered cow.

           While teaching Bhisham Sahni’s Tamas to a class of students predominantly from the North East, they were clueless as to how people could be so callous and crass to kill each other for the innocuous and ordinary animals as pigs and cows. Pakistan is an Islamic Republic. Bangladesh followed suit; it is no longer secular; Islam is its state religion. Official status of pork in these two countries must be that of haram, but one is unsure if they have also banned slaughter of pigs altogether. But here in India no matter how much they try to convince that beef is not banned but only cow slaughter, it is anybody’s guess that unless one slaughters cattle one cannot invent beef. Imagine if a judge, following irresistible ‘call of the soul’, in the place of ‘celibate, tear jerking peacocks’, recommends chicken as India’s national bird and its eggs as national treasure! Soon venerable murgshalas might start cropping up  imposing a moral obligation on the central government again to ban ‘culling of cocks and hen’ as well, though not ‘eating chicken’, as it were.

            In the wake of a ferocious logic to turn India vegetarian, it is noteworthy that even the Vedic period, which is considered the 'origin of aeroplanes to supercomputers', cattle slaughter was rather common. Even Sage Manu, exceptionally notorious for prescribing brutal casteism and other obscurantist practices, had sanctioned eating of many wild animals. Among domestic animals, any animal with teeth in jaw was allowed with the exception of camel, but not the cow. (The Myth of the Holy Cow, D N Jha, 91). For Manu eating meat on sacrificial occasions was a divine rule- daivah vidih smrtah. In the Mahabharata Yudhisthira, who was averse to himsa, used to regularly hunt wild animals for his brothers, his wife Draupadi and the Brahmins who used to live nearby. (Jha 95) The sixth century BC Sanskrit grammarian, Panini, used the word goghna, meaning killing of cow, as a synonym for ‘guest’ because the sages used to kill calves and cows to entertain guests. (Jha 33)

       Animals deserve protection, but when this becomes an outrageous agenda particularly with the sadist intention of offending and targeting the ‘other’, it is an ominous sign of a colossal doom. Noted Tamil playwright Indira Parthasarathi in his play, Aurangzeb, has depicted how the great Mughal empire began to collapse during the reign of Aurangzeb not because he was vanquished by the collective force of others but by the weight of his own bigotry and monstrous obstinacy to refuse to accept the plurality and diversity of his empire, which he was fanatically obsessed to turn into one country, Hindostan; with one language, Hindostani and one religion, Islam. Are we, through a queer twist of history, back to the regime of mad dreams of crazy despots? Then, if the present regime crumbles like that of Aurangzeb’s, they should not blame it on others.

            It is quite likely, given the present obsession of the state with the cow, that a student might well begin his first essay thus, “The cow is a national animal. It is mostly found in the government institutes called goushalas. In olden days when there were farmers they used to keep them at home. Now it is not possible to keep cow without special permit and licence from the government. Cow milk is very good, but very expensive. Only very big and rich people can drink milk. My uncle bought two packets of milk from a foreign country. I once drank that milk. It was very tasty.”

           This might well be a sad opening on a famous topic.

Email: rajaprodhani@gmail.com

Phone: 9436315650

http://www.theshillongtimes.com/2017/06/14/the-cow-is-a-four-footed-domestic-animal/

My Article in the Assam Tribune, 11 February, 2017

State Budget: Is it Inclusive for All?

http://www.assamtribune.com/scripts/spat.asp?id=2017/feb1117/BigPage6.jpg

The Shillong Times

                                                                     Established 1945

The Trump Tremor: The President of  “Forgotten people”

PUBLIC | THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 17, 2016

By Jyotirmoy Prodhani

            It was unexpected. At least going by the Twitter trolls, FB posts, TV channels, print media, opinion polls, long panel discussions, academic discourses and the hectic corporate activism in her favour, Hillary Clinton was on the verge making history to restore everything that the rational society believed as right. But on the result day there was hardly a moment that gave a pause to indicate any possibility for Hillary’s win, it was Trump all the way, fiercely unstoppable. A very significant section of the world lamented with horror, “The worst has happened”. What actually went wrong?

            Despite being one of America’s richest, he seemed to have lacked the finesse and polish one expects from a prospective POTUS, some kind of suavity and appeal that Pierce Brosnan and George Clooney exude. Obama had it. As for Hillary she reflected the subtle nuances of her class, a Yale returned former First Lady occupying a significant political post to have enough exposure to world politics, she truly belonged to her class. For many, being a woman added to her qualification, she gave America the great opportunity to choose their first woman president. She personified almost a heady mix of perfect and ideal discursive proprieties, a sophisticated blend of everything correct. Against such circumstances Trump’s win has turned out to be dumbfounding, generating astonishment and at the same time desperate anger. The supporters of Hillary, the Twitterati, social media enthusiasts and the powerful mainstream media including television and print, are up in arms against Trump with the intention to create a possible blockade on the road to the White House forcing Trump to be stranded on the road despite the absolute verdict in his pocket. Desperation is so acute, leading to a campaign to sabotage the process, quite in Indian style, by trying to convince the Republican Electorate College vote for Hillary instead of Trump on December 19 in blatant disregard to the faith with which the common people voted them to the Congress. Trump, actually, is seen to have risen from the ashes of an apocalypse. His victory is widely interpreted as the assertion of White supremacy as well as a vicious manifestation of anti immigration anxieties.

            Trump has legitimately won the election through a constitutionally valid electoral process of the land. But the amount of hatred and indignation inflicted on Trump after his victory, quite curiously, is symptomatic of what is generally attributed to Trump- deep seated hatred towards the ‘other’. Trump has quite clearly been rejected by the elites, the university and college educated sophisticated lot, the economically affluent well earning metropolitan section, by the powerful group that arguably control and regulate opinions and views, by the mainstream media barons, the corporate powerhouses that operate at the global scale and, of course, the majority of the non White and immigrant Americans. Then how come has he won?

            Instead of taking a grand stand to define what the US election this time meant, it can also be seen from simpler vantages. It was an election between the Democrats and the Republicans; between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. When Hillary got 232 of the electorates, Trump got a whopping 306. The Democrats were in power for the last sixteen years with Bill Clinton and Obama’s consecutive two terms each (with four years in between of Republican George W. Bush). The Democratic rule, however, has not been all about great glories, nor was the Republican interlude. But this time the election was largely determined by the poor, unemployed, less educated, vulnerable and insecure citizens though mostly comprising the Whites as against the White elites. It is evident that the rule of the Democrats and their jealous campaign for globalisation brought wider gaps to make clear division among people as beneficiaries and victims. It is the victims who had voted Trump to victory this election. 64 percent of the White Americans who form 45 % of the electorate do not have college level education. They are deluded with the great capitalist dream of globalisation. Most of them live in abject poverty and cannot afford even Obamacare health facilities nor can they meet the very basics of human needs when retrenchment has become for them a familiar fate.

            Ashutosh Varshney has revealed the curious pattern of votes cast in this election. 67 percent of non college educated voters voted for Trump and 28 percent for Hillary. This was expected. Which is perplexing is that when 49 percent of college educated voted for Trump, Hillary got only 45 percent of their votes. Besides, the minorities, the Hispanics, the Asians, the Blacks did not go for Hillary gung ho. In fact, she polled much less votes from these constituencies than what Obama had got. Trump even polled 8 percent Black votes and 29 percent Hispanics. Apparently Hillary was not an overwhelming favourite even for the traditional voters of the Democrats. More importantly, when Hillary has been projected as the natural choice of the feminists, the women vote she got was far from impressive. Though she has got more overall women votes, 54 percent women votes as against 43 percent for Trump, but among White women 53 percent voted for Trump when 43 percent voted for Hillary. Evidently Hillary Clinton was not the universal choice even among women.  After all, Hillary Clinton is not the epitome of all those ideals, a personification of those great values what Trump is not.    As a politician, holding powerful positions, she cannot boast of an impeccable career that was beyond any trace of visceral allegations. Her stint as the Secretary of State was mired with some of the nastiest of controversies.  Besides, after a long and largely disappointing Democratic rule in terms of economic and social security, the people of America deserved a change, more so, the people whom Trump addressed as the “forgotten men and women. The people who work hard but no longer have a voice.” Trump wanted to be their “voice”. America’s ‘voiceless’, America’s subaltern, as it were, deserved to elect a President of their own as they believed, writes Katty Kay of the BBC, “he gets me, he understands my struggle”.

            This election has opened up a new territory for the rest of the world- the odious underbelly of the opulent America, beyond California and New York, the two of the major states where Hillary swept the election. The world is hardly aware of the rural angst, the perennial existential anxieties of the working class in the urban conurbations of America, who were the ones seemed to have made a point. This is the group of people nobody bothered to take into account while framing their strategies to ensure Hillary’s win.  This election has also made this imperative to reconfigure the perspectives and discourses on the issues of globalisation, demographic anxiety, sense of economic and social insecurity, question of mass influx, lack of employment even in the first world and so on. Instead of enforcing ruptures and be constantly accusative of the host entities, there is a need to address the issue with mutually appreciative and respectful idioms in order to create a congenial climate of mutual trust and confidence. So far the liberal discourses on the issues have been mono-directional, resulting in the extreme consequences like Trump victory.

            Despite the despicable record of his utterly politically incorrect campaign trail, Trump’s victory speech on November 9 was laudably inclusive for he proclaimed to be the President for “everyone” and pledged to work for America by reaching out to all, even to his opponents.   However, his prospective presidency is not devoid of any uncanny premonitions either. It was George W. Bush, a Republican, who had changed the world forever through his contemptible craze for devastation; similar predilection in Trump, if cultivated, might well spell another regime of irrevocable doom. Trump now has to prove what he meant in his victory speech, after all the cards are now in his hands to lay it right.

(Jyotirmoy Prodhani is a Professor in the Dept. of English at NEHU, Shillong and can be reached  at rajaprpodhani@gmail.com

(NB: As for popular vote Trump got 62,972, 226 when Hillary got 62,277,750)

Read more at http://www.theshillongtimes.com/2016/11/17/the-trump-tremor-the-president-of-the-forgotten-people/#yRpyGHwlxshTY32a.99

The Shillong Times

                                                                     Established 1945

Theatre of the Earth

SUNDAY JULY 27 2014

Jyotirmoy Prodhani on theatre patriarch H Kanhailal who was in Shillong to showcase his creativity

CELEBRATED THEATRE director Ratan Thiyam is known for creating ‘Theatre of Roots’, a term popularised by two contemporary theatre critics Suresh Awasthi and Richard Schechner. But Heisnam Kanhailal, the patriarch of modern Indian theatre from Manipur, calls his movement the ‘Theatre of the Earth’.

            He elaborated: “My theatre is that of the earth. It is essentially rooted in the earth and does not necessarily descend from heaven; it is informed by the accumulated wisdom that gathered from the earth, from here and now, our surroundings, our milieu. It intimately emanates from its own ecology, its own native landscape.”

Kanhailal added, “After all, not only art, even science has emerged from the earth. If one looks at life away from this reality, one is unceremoniously dislocated from his native ground. Even the social experiences of the individual and the community are actually solidified through its intimate linkages with the earth.”

            This understanding of theatre apparently inspired him to put up two of his earlier radical productions which redefined and destabilised the conventional notions of theatre space and theatre actors. Nupi Lan (War of Women of 1939) was first performed in 1989 marked a new beginning of Kanhailal’s repertoire. The play was performed in Ima Keithel (Mother’s Market), the famous all-women market of Imphal, and was performed by the women of the market themselves.

            About 10 years ago, he made a similar experiment with his 1979 play, Sanjennaha (cowherd), which he staged at the remote village of Umathel where the local Paite tribal villagers were the performers. He thus brought theatre to a reversed trajectory. Instead of people coming to theatre, theatre went to them to be a part of their own experience.

Kanhailal’s creative differences with Thiyam as a theatre director are pronounced and he is candid about his disagreement with his legendary compatriot. On Thiyam his observations are non-ambiguous. “Thiyam’s plays are fantastic, they make majestic theatrical presence and are superbly spectacular. It is a mindboggling visual treat. But for me theatre is not only about copious extravaganza, it is essentially about the intimate nuances, the raw earthy immediacy of experiences. This is what Theatre of Roots is all about,” he said.

            He had adapted one of his most powerful plays, Dopdi (2000) from Mahasweata Devi’s eponymous short story ‘Draupadi’. The story immediately drew his attention for it dealt with the theme of universal experience of human suffering and oppression. It is of an adivasi woman of Bengal, whose husband was killed in a fake encounter, and was raped by an army captain. H Savitiri, Kanhailal’s actor wife and who is a Padma Shree recipient like him, played the lead.

            But quite significantly the play turned out to be a premonition of a real life event in the history of Manipur. In Dopdi, the protagonist, takes off her clothes one by one and dares the army officer to rape her turning the defenceless naked body of her womanhood into the most powerful weapon of resistance and challenge. The play was a huge draw in the major Indian cities, but back home in Manipur it courted massive controversy. A section of women organisations of Imphal demanded the play be pulled out when the NGOs, mostly of the youths, wanted the play to continue. The play turned quite prophetic when a group of women came out on to the street, in front of the Kangla Fort, stripped naked, proclaiming “Indian Army rape us” to protest the killing and alleged rape of Thangjam Manorama by the 17 Sector Assam Rifles on 11 July 2004. Kanhailal received phone calls. The callers addressed him as Ching’ü, the foreseer.

            For Kanhailal theatre is essentially grounded with ideology and a deep-rooted social commitment. Theatre is not a detached art, it must become a voice for the voiceless, a means that gives the power to the disempowered to resist. From the vantage of such vision Kanhailal said: “Theatre must speak for the weak, the vulnerable and the voiceless. Or else what should theatre strive for? I am always obsessed with Jesus; he has been a constant inspiration for me. He has sacrificed himself for the weaker section of the people. Similarly, theatre too should act heroically like Spartacus who turned ordinary slaves into formidable soldiers to fight valiantly against the oppressive rule of the Roman oligarchy.”

            Pebet (1975) and Memoirs of Africa (1985) are two of his most celebrated productions which were recently performed during the Theatre Appreciation Course programme at NEHU, Shillong, with one of the first NSD graduates from Shillong, Lapdiang Artimai Syiem, as the force behind organising the event. Pebet is one of the earliest productions of Kanhailal that drew worldwide attention for the unique dramatic narrative that he invented as an alternative theatre idiom.

            Many critics including Rustom Bharucha categorised Kanhailal’s theatre as ‘Poor Theatre’ where the usual theatrical extravaganza is conspicuously missing. But despite such stark lack of opulence and their apparent destitution the impact is unmistakable, it is tangibly piercing and overwhelmingly potent. In both these performances it is the body of the actor that becomes the central source of power, the ultimate store house of theatrical energy. It is the superb manipulation and control of the body through which the story emanates with the force and impact of corporeal poetry.

            Kanhailal picked up the story of Pebet from a Manipuri folk tale which he improvised to tell a story of contemporary relevance. Pebet is a rare bird of Manipur, smaller than sparrow and the story is all about the mother pebet (performed with poetic grace by Sabitri) and her struggle to protect her broods from the vicious claws of a prying cat (brilliantly performed by Tombi). After several attempts the crafty cat manages to get hold of the youngest and weakest chick, indoctrinates it and reduces it into his veritable slave. The worried mother frenetically searches for her lost brood and slumps into a state of stupor visited by a nightmare where all her broods are lured by the proselytised chick into the trap of the mischievous cat. They are subjected to so much of atrocious subjugation that they even happily lick the arse of the cat, literally. But one of them protests and peels off parts of the buttock of the cat with the scrunching of his resolute teeth. The aberrant brood is then subjected to brutal torture by his own siblings at the instance of the cat. The cat even successfully entangles them in fratricidal violence against each other, who even go to the extent of attacking their own mother ironically chanting the Sanskrit phrase, janani janma bhumishya sargadapi garioyoshi (mother and the motherland are greater than even paradise). However, the proselytised broods recover from the state of their forced subservience and successfully come out of the diabolic clutch of the cat. Significantly, the whole drama has been a nightmare of the mother after the abduction of her youngest chic.

            The first thing that captivates the audience is the rhythm and poise of the performance that encapsulates every dramatic moment of the play, and more importantly, though the audience are not aware of the actual story that is to unfold yet, they soon realise that they are actually watching birds on stage though none of the actors would wear any improvised costume. In fact, there is no costume, no setting, no music, and no dialogue; there are only movements and the gradual unfolding of the story through their lyrical acts. The first major dramatic moment of pure brilliance occurs when the eggs of the mother pebet bursts open and the chicks come out of the shells.

            The entire episode is enacted not with any high-tech props or any special effect but with mere movements of their bare bodies and rhythmic verbal noise, “tet, tet, tet, tet…” In fact, “tet, tet, tet…” and “pebet, te tu” have been the recurring sounds in the play that form the central ‘dialogue’ to communicate the story to the audience, and for the audience they have no difficulty at all in understanding their moments of joy, fear, pain and anger presented through the periodic modulation of that basic noise, “tet, tet…” This is its biggest theatrical triumph.

            In the context of the battered political reality of the Northeast in general and of Manipur in particular the play becomes not only as one of the most significant and powerful critiques but also an extended metaphor of the internecine political violence and bankrupt ideology that have taken the entire region to ransom. One who is an insider and has suffered the morbid brutalities of militancy and its diabolic consequences in personal and community life can immediately identify with the characters and comprehend each move which has shown in the play as the trajectory leading to a horrendous degeneration of the very fundamentals of human values, the collapse of logic and the tragic crumbling of the age old ethos that used to ensure the sense of belongingness of the communities living in here as its native denizens.

            Memoirs of Africa is an outstanding achievement of H Sabitiri. Based on a poignant poem by L. Samarendra Singh, “Africagee Wakhanda Gee”, the play is a physical poetry in motion. The solo performance captures the most devastating experiences of human history across civilizations where the epochal turmoil of Africa transforms into a profound metaphoric trope to narrate the tale of universal human encounter with suffering and devastating repression. This has been one of the most accomplished performances of Sabitri where, through entirely non-verbal renditions, she has so vividly and energetically narrates man’s most shattering encounter with the tumultuous epochs of brutalities, overwhelming atrocities, betrayal and unspeakable carnage that scorched the pastoral innocence of life into searing landscape of parched nostalgia. The play is without dialogue, apart from occasional verbal noise with varied intonation there is hardly any other physical sound used in the play, not even music but the impact is overpoweringly tangible and intensely moving.

            As part of his mission to reach out to the communities in peripheries, Kanhailal has expanded his theatrical reach beyond the boundaries of Manipur. Assam and Tripura are two of his new theatre destinations. In Assam he has set up community theatre in the Rabha villages of Goalpara with talented NSD alumni Pabitra Rabha.

http://www.theshillongtimes.com/2014/07/27/theatre-of-the-earth/

http://www.nezine.com/

“I call my theatre as the Theatre of the Earth”- 

Heisnam Kanhailal

Jyotirmoy Prodhani

Date of Publish: 2015-11-15

INTERVIEW

“I call my theatre as the Theatre of the Earth”- Heisnam Kanhailal

An interview with the noted theatre personality of modern Indian theatre from Manipur, a recipient of Padma Shri award, Heisnam Kanhailal by Jyotirmoy Prodhani. This interview was taken when Kanhailal visited  North Eastern Hill  University in Shillong as the key resource person for a theatre appreciation course organised by National School of Drama in 2014.  There he had staged his plays and demonstrated his theatre methodology. In an intimate conversation he reflects on his own genre of theatre tradition that he has evolved.

JP: You have evolved a new theatrical idiom and have also incorporated various native elements from Manipur to give a specific identity to your theatre. How would you like to define your theatre?

H. Kanhailal:  “Theatre of the Earth. This is how I would like to call my theatre. My theatre is the theatre of the earth, it is essentially rooted in the earth and do not necessarily descend from heaven, it is informed by the accumulated wisdom that gathered from the earth, from here and now, our surroundings, our milieu. It intimately emanates from its own ecology, its own native landscape. After all, not only art, even science has emerged from the earth. If one looks at life away from this reality, one is unceremoniously dislocated from one's native ground. Even the social experiences of the individual and the community are actually solidified through its intimate linkages with the earth”

JP: How different is your theatre from that of Ratan Thiyam who is also known as one of the exponents of what is called “Theatre of Roots”?

H. Kanhailal: “Ratan Thiyam’s plays are fantastic; they make majestic theatrical presence and are superbly spectacular. It is a mindboggling visual treat. But for me theatre is not only about copious extravaganza, it is essentially about the intimate nuances, the raw earthy immediacy of experiences. This is what “Theatre of Earth” is all about. I strongly believe that theatre is essentially grounded with ideology and a deep rooted social commitment.”

JP: What is the inherent ideology of your theatre, ‘Theatre of Earth’ that is?

H. Kanhailal: “Theatre is not a detached art, it is strongly linked with its ideological commitments for it must become a voice for the voiceless, a means that gives the power and strength to the disempowered to resist and take on the challenges. Theatre must speak for the weak, the vulnerable, the voiceless. Or else what should theatre strive for? I always think of Jesus; he has been a constant inspiration for me. He has sacrificed himself for the weaker section of the people. Similarly, theatre too should act heroically like Spartacus who turned ordinary slaves into formidable soldiers to fight valiantly against the oppressive rule of the Roman oligarchy.”

JP: How do you think your theatre could achieve that goal?

H. Kanhailal: This has been my mission to bring theatre closer to the people not only as audience but as participants. One of my early experiments was Nupi Lan, (women’s war of 1939) which we produced in 1989. This was one of the first plays in Manipur where the women of Imphal’s famous all women market, Ima Keithel (mother’s market), were my actors who had  performed the play in the market shed itself. We had produced another play in 1979,   Sanjennaha (cowherd) which was performed in a remote village of Umathel where the local Paite tribal villagers were the performers. 

JP: What are the issues that you often try to address through your theatre?

H. Kanhailal: Theatre must be able to question the conventional representations and its politics. For example, even the great epic like the Mahabharata is not free from this vice. I was moved by the complexities of the character of Karna in theMahabharata. I was inspired by Karna to carry out a theatrical experiment. I wrote a play on him, Karna, which we produced in 1997. For me this is one of my most significant productions where I tried to raise the question of social segregation and politics of caste and marginalisation. The last scene of the play is very significant when Karna dies. Though his actual mother Kunti had abandoned him as an infant in order to avoid embarrassment but as he died she comes to claim the body of her son for cremation as an Aryaputra. It is an irony that when he was alive she never came to claim her motherhood upon him but when he dies she wants to preserve his caste sanctity.  There also arrives Radha, Karna’s shudra step mother. Interestingly, since she was a shudra, she was barred from shedding tears at the death her son. However, she also laid claim on the body of Karna for cremation. Now who actually had the real claim over the body of Karna? There I tried to answer the question through the spirit of Karna. The spirit of Karna said, ‘I am none of your son, I am the son of the author of this great epic, Vyasa. It is he who made me, it is he who orphaned me. I am his prodigy, only he has the claim over me, only he can bring finality to my present status of ambivalence.’ You see this question still persists as to who determines the mode of our representations in society, who has the rightful claims over the rights we often fight for. Through my theatre I try to address these issues though I do not claim that I have got those answers yet.”

JP: Your Dopdi is also quite significant.

H. Kanhailal: “It is one of the most controversial also. I had picked up the story from Mahasweta Devi’s short story. The story had a huge impact on me for I found the story to have strong relevance to our own context. This is a powerful story of universal experience of human suffering and oppression. This is the story of an adivasi woman of Bengal, whose husband was killed in a fake encounter, and was raped by a Senanayak, a captain of the Indian Army. Sabitri (Sabitiri Heisnam, Kanhailal’s actor wife) played the lead role in the play. In the play she peels her cloth off one by one and dares the Senanayak to rape her. The defenseless naked body of a woman turned out to be the most powerful weapon to mutilate the masochism of state brutality. In the play Sabitri actually removed all her cloth, stood all naked in front of the army Captain with the back of her body facing the audience. It was completely a new theatrical experience for the audience. The play was hugely appreciated in the metropolises like Delhi and Calcutta. The scene made the most powerful theatrical statement with that audacious act. The critics came and met me to shower their praises. But the same play when performed in Manipur drew strong reactions. It became a big controversy. I was threatened and was asked to pull out the play. But interestingly many NGOs of young people supported my play and wanted me to continue with the play. But quite significantly, the play turned out to be a prophetic premonition. The play opened in 2000, but when in 2004 (11 July, 2004) the Kangla incident happened with the Manipuri women stripped completely to protest against the killing and rape of Thongjam Manorama by the Assam Rifles personnel, with that famous banner, “Indian Army, Rape Us”, they found a strange resonance of the play I had produced some four years before. I received phone calls where the callers used to address me as “Ching’ü”, the foreseer or a prophet.

JP: You have an elaborate module of theatre training in your Kalakshetra Manipur, the most famous abode of learning theatre. What are the principles that are cultivated?

H. Kanhailal: “Theatre is not only about enacting roles on stage for the shows alone. It is an art of complete commitment. Acting is not as simple as it seems when one sees it on stage. Acting is a discipline of extreme rigour. You must have complete control over your whole body, mind and spirit. Here everyone goes through a rigorous training regime which includes voice coaching, physical training, martial art, meditation, training on music and dance and so on. We have picked up elements from various sources, for there are so many things we have to learn from. Our actors learn meditation from the Buddhist schools of meditation, they learn about physical movements and voice control and modulation from the movements and voices of animals, birds and even from the trees. It is a comprehensive training module, after all to become an actor one needs to be alert and be one with