Direction : Sohini Sengupta & Arghya Dey Sarkar
Synopsis :
Nabanna (New Harvest) – a Bengali cult drama was written by Bijon Bhattacharya and first staged by Indian People’s Theatre Association (IPTA). The classic play is set against the backdrop of the man-made artificial Bengal famine in 1943 that took away millions of lives due to starvation, malnutrition and the resultant diseases. The play represents the horrific reality of hunger, dehumanization and death.
The drama revolves around the Samaddar family, headed by the old Pradhan Samaddar, a peasant in Bengal, who has been driven to near madness due to the prolonged famine and the gnawing hunger that had killed two of his sons of starvation. In addition to the highhandedness of land sharks, a tidal wave destroys the family’s crops, homes, hopes and everything. In a desperate bid to survive, they walk all the way from the fictional Aminpur village to Kolkata, however, the apathetic Kolkata middle-class renders them disillusioned very soon. Pradhan returns home, enraged and humiliated to join his starving fellow villagers and vows to restart a quest for dignified survival by countering their fate with a new strategy.
Nandikar (Bengali: নান্দীকার) is a theatre group in India. The group has its headquarters in Kolkata in the state of West Bengal, but works around the world.
We are a 66 Years-year-old theatre institution from Kolkata, India. We have been at the forefront of the national theatre movement since our inception in 1960. Our logo was designed by Satyajit Ray. For diversity, quality and scale of its sustained activities, Nandikar has earned a niche in the national cultural calendar.
NANDIKAR, NOT JUST A THEATRE GROUP but an Institution
Nandikar has produced about 80 Plays, performed these nearly 8500 times across the nation, featuring in all major National/State Festivals, as well as abroad. Quite a number of its productions, e.g. Natyakarer Sandhane Chhati Charitra, Tin Poysar Pala, Bhalomanush, Football, Antigone, etc., have been performed for more than 400 nights each.
National Theatre Festival, organised by Nandikar and in its 37th year now, is one of the foremost events in the theatre calendar of India.
Our theatre and communication training programs and workshops, tailor-made for actors, children, college students and corporates, are pioneering work in the field of application of performing arts in communication skill development and personality development.
We work with differently abled persons, correctional home inmates, deprived persons and residents of red light areas.
Office Address:
47/1, Shyambazar Street,
Kolkata - 700004
Training / Rehearsal:
Federation Hall
Acharya Prafulla Chandra Road, 3rd Floor, Machuabazar
Kolkata - 700009
Phone : (+91) 81012 92690 / (+91) 74390 61346
