Bhubaneswar: Purba Ranga, a five-day National Theatre Festival, began here at Rabindra Mandap, Monday. The event is being jointly organised by the State Culture Department in collaboration with Eastern Zonal Cultural Centre, Kolkata and Odisha Natya Sangh, a confederation of hundreds of theatre troupes from the state.
City-based Jeevan Rekha Theatre troupe presented Odia play Seeta on the first day of the festival. Written by late Ratiranjan Mishra, the play was designed and directed by Abhinna Routray.
The central character of the play was Seeta but she was not the one from epic Ramayan. As the play progresses, she became the reason behind conflicts between four friends who had discovered her in the dead of night. But at the end, none of them succeeded to win her heart.
The moral of the story was every woman should be treated with respect, not like an object.
“Apart from sending a message to the audience, the play has a style of its own. While we have presented it in Geetinatya format, the viewers can enjoy Chhau dance and folk music at various points during the narration. However, the actors deliver contemporary dialogues,” said the play director Abhinna Routray.
Four Hindi plays will be staged over the next four days of the festival, added Routray.
The dignitaries present on the occasion included Culture Department Director Ranjan Kumar Das, Odisha Sangeet Natak Akademi President Ramakrushna Sahoo, Secretary Prabodh Kumar Rath and eminent theatre practitioner Prasanna Mishra.
PNN
