When Jana Natya Manch joined Palestine's Freedom Theatre

How does theatre survive, and thrive, in a war-torn region? How do the concepts of freedom and dissent translate into a play? What role do the arts serve for the community? Can, or should, that role remain apolitical?
Over the fortnight he spent at the Jenin Refugee Camp in Palestine, Sudhanva Deshpande hoped he would get at least a glimpse of the answers.An actor and director with the Delhi-based street theatre group, Jana Natya Manch, Deshpande had collaborated on a project earlier this year, with Palestine's Freedom Theatre-a community-based cultural centre on West Bank. At the refugee camp in Jenin, which houses over 16,000 residents, he worked with the local youth on plays, conducted workshops and learnt firsthand what theatre means in a society where political conflict is a permanent backdrop to daily life.
"Theatre there isn't pure art. It cannot be," says Deshpande, who shared his experiences at a talk organized by Junoon theatre group's Mumbai Local initiative on Saturday. "As they said to me, they're training freedom fighters. But the weapons used are tools of culture. And it is phenomenal what they have managed to do."
The Freedom Theatre's mission to explore the potential of arts as a catalyst for social change finds parallels in Jana Natya Manch's work. The Palestinian organization, founded by Juliano Mer-Khamis in 2006, uses theatre as a means of protest and resistance, performing in towns and villages across northern West Bank. Jana Natya Manch (Janam), a left-wing, street theatre group, too uses open spaces as a stage. Founded in the 1970s by Safdar Hashmi, its plays span issues like unemployment and women's rights, performed across working-class neighbourhoods.
"It's still assumed-wrongly, I think-that the youth in India aren't very interested in politics," says Deshpande. "Whereas in Palestine, there's just no escaping it." For the group of students Deshpande worked with, 'dissent' and 'subjugation' weren't terms confined to textbooks. One of the plays the Freedom Theatre staged was based on the 39-day siege of Bethlehem by the Israeli army in 2002. "Only the Israeli narrative had been reported in the Western media," Deshpande says. "'The Siege' was how these theatre groups tried to get the truth out."
He remembers a session where he introduced Janam's work to the audience. The presentation included photos and clips with red flags in the background.
"Afterwards, a young boy stood up and asked me, 'Are you a communist?'" Deshpande recalls, laughing. "What was lovely about it was that he said it with admiration. In other countries like the US, for instance, the term 'communist' gets an entirely different reaction. The Left in Palestine, while not politically strong, still commands a lot of respect."
The theatre scene is Palestine is "absolutely fantastic", he adds. Despite the available infrastructure being a fraction of what American or European theatres own, the quality of the productions as well performances is high. In December, a team from Freedom Theatre will travel to India for another collaboration. The resulting plays will be staged across cities, including Mumbai.