S enior Kathak dancer-teacher Shama Bhate’s production, ‘Mahabharata Reinterpreted - Ateet ki Parchhaiyan (Shadows of the Past)’ begins just where the great battle at Kurukshetra ends. The battlefield is strewn with blood and dead soldiers, monkeys, birds and other animals. The key players, including the dead Duryodhana and Karna, step back and re-look at the palace intrigues, the hate and the jealousy that led to the war. The concert took place at Kartik Fine Arts.
The epic is a complex story of relationships, dealing with the tricky issues of right and wrong and what defines loyalty and duty. Shama’s ambitious project goes beyond Vyasa’s work, to serve as a post-script, to explain different points of view, with clear references to the events in question.
‘Mahabharata...’ was more a drama using dance, than a dance-drama. It had a well-researched script (Shama), with narration in Hindi and an all-star cast of Indian classical dancers representing seven different styles – Duryodhana (Rakesh Sai Babu - Chhau), Draupadi (Ameera Patankar - Kathak), Karna (Vaibhav Arekar- Bharatanatyam), Bhishma (Dr. Ettumanoor Kannan - Kathakali), Gandhari (Gopika Varma - Mohiniyattam), Kunti (Vyjayanthi Kashi – Kuchipudi) and Yudhishtira (Ramli Ibrahim - Odissi).
It opened with an angry Duryodhana thirsting for revenge, after which the focus turns to a sombre Draupadi reflecting on the bloodshed, ‘Yeh mere ahankaar ki saza? Atal tha? Zaroori tha?’ (Was this a punishment for my pride? Was it my adamant behaviour? Was it necessary?) She mourns Ashwattama’s killing of her five sons, the Upapandavas, and says she has lost her identity, that this must be her fate.
The next scene was the dice game leading up to Draupadi’s desperate plea for help. The actors freeze in the moment, the stage darkens, and Duryodhana comes back with his reflections, ‘Maine haq maangne ka dand tha? Andh pitha ke adhoori sapne..’ (Was this a punishment for asking for my rights? My blind father’s unfulfilled dreams...) ‘My brother was looking at me when Bhima broke his head; I had given Bhima poison…’ and the scene moves into a flashback, to the time when Bhima was given poison to drink and when the wax house was set on fire.
These enactments were not complete; they were staged and left hanging as reference points. The focus then moved to Bhishma, on the bed of arrows, with Duryodhana in the background. Such was the sequencing, without any chronological order, only that each was given his or her place in the sun.
The echoing of Draupadi’s famous words, ‘Andhe pitha ke putra andhe hote hain,’ when Duryodhana falls in the Palace of Illusions, Draupadi touching her nose ring, a symbol of married women, when being dragged to Dritarashtra’s court, etc., also meant that versions other than Vyasa’s were presented.
Like the text, the framework was also complicated as the events and portrayals went back and forth. It required an agile mind and a good knowledge of the epic to be able to follow the production. The script is unavoidably rather dark, full of questions, sadness, regret, despair. The uninspiring, loud music and the overdone rhetoric only made the production heavier.
In between portrayals, like turning the page, there was a Kathak sequence, with girls dressed in black kurtas and matching churidars dancing across the stage. They might have relieved the heavy mood, but for the costume colour. ‘Mahabharat…’ was a cerebral work of high merit but it did not have much room for artistry - the stage was too crowded with dancers and ideas jostling for space.
To Shama's credit, the two-hour production did not sag. Her deft presentation skills ensured smooth transitions. There were, however, some scenes that were more appealing. For instance, the Karna portrayal, which was drenched in beautiful melody and imagery, inducing pathos and Gandhari’s story of the birth of a hundred sons, which was fittingly gruesome. Bhishma’s regrets came through with feeling while Yudhishtira’s romance with Draupadi was sensitively portrayed. The truly evil persona of the Chhau artists, Rakesh and Rajesh Sai Babu, as Duryodhana and Dushasana carried energy and exhilaration. Kunti and Draupadi were convincing.
It was interesting that the star cast could not salvage the artistic component in the show.
