The episodically-built play, lo Phir Basant Ayee, laments the ordinary folk of Pakistan who are unable to protect their identity, culture and values. By Utpal K Banerjee
Pakistan’s premier city, lahore is full of oriental attractions: with its gorgeous food-stalls, tasteful attires of men and women, gaudily-bedecked trucks, et al. Known as a zinda-dil (live-hearted) metropolis, it wakes up to its charms particularly during the festivals like Basant (spring), New Year, Valentine’s Day, Mela Chiraghan (the lamps’ fair) and many others which are increasingly getting frowned upon. The Kite Festival in spring had been the most endearing feature for the old-timers who had been there, but it is not there any more.The muti-hued skies have disappeared; the sound of Bo Kata (the expression of jubilation when you cut an opponent’s kite string) has been drowned forever.
lo Phir Basant Ayee, was presented recently by Ajoka Theatre from lahore — in the Pakistani Humsaya Festival under the aegis of Routes2roots — in the capital. The play captures, in the anguished words of its director Madeeha Gauhar, “The story of a beautiful place where people had believed that the walls built around the perimeters would protect them from marauding invaders for all times. But the insidious enemy stealthily broke in, the gates disappeared and the city was held hostage from within by an enemy which is now stealing everything — their valuables, their values, their culture and their identity.”
The episodically-built play, written by Shahid Nadeem, begins with a master craftsman Ustaad Mauju living under the shadows of a decrepit Delhi Gate in lahore. His family has been making delicate and colourful kites for the people of his city for centuries. The major part of the play comprises his epic lamentation on the weal and woe of the ordinary folks who do not comprehend what is going on any more. There is a professor who tries to sensitise his students to Harappa — the seat of Indus Valley civilisation — near lahore, but he is peremptorily told what to teach and what not to. The young lovers, sitting coyly on the same college-bench, are summarily separated. There is a little urchin, who sees raanee in his dreams and wants to fly with her into the sky, is hushed up. The ‘Rok Tham Committee’ — with a mullah heading a clutch of muscle-men — is keeping a very close watch everywhere and even holding a slide-show of relative size of incendiary bombs, available around. And, amidst it all, life goes on, complete with young lovers throwing love-chits at each other and quarrelling neighbourhood wives mocking one another — from adjoining roofs.
The play asks poignantly — Basant does arrive, but will it be celebrated in the besieged cityIJ If young boys are whisked away for flying kites and if kite-makers like Mauju are put behind bars for creating delicate, colourul kites, willl the spirit of zinda-dil lahore dieIJ As long as there is one pretty little kite flying on a single roof-top, will the dream of the flying delight and freedom get a new lease of lifeIJ
Extracts of interaction with the director:
Is the main happening spot, Delhi Gate, a fictional placeIJ
No, it very much exists in lahore, just as there is a lahori Gate in Delhi.
Mauju’s commentary on the current state of affairs is very touching...
Yes, we have kept his narrative at deliberately lyrical — and even emotional — levels to voice sentiments of the common man. Arshad Durani, who enacts this role, is an octogenarian who hails from Amritsar and used to cycle from his city and lahore, as a child.
Is your theme song, lo phir basant ayee…, an old refrainIJ
Yes, it is a very well-known song, sung by Mallika Pokhraj, from the forties of the last century.
How far does the play reflect current realitiesIJ
It is one hundred per cent correct. lahore’s most famous kite festival stands banned today, Even flying of kites is totally a taboo. Today our skies are barren and even the birds are being driven away. Spring arrives, but there is no colour, no joy.
Isn’t there sanction of Amir Khusrau behind Basant FestivalIJ
It’s very much so. Amir Khusrau was so much taken in by nature’s beauty in spring that he used to celebrate it at the dargah of his murshed Khwaja Nizamusdddin Aulia. Since his time, Basant festival had remained a perfectly secular one, celebrated by Hindus, Muslims, Yehudis and Isais alike.