Natrang to stage 17 plays
KT NEWS SERVICE JAMMU, July 16: To commemorate 25 years of its existence, the theater group from Jammu Natrang is organizing the biggest ever theater festival of the country featuring 17 plays including two street plays at Jammu.
Addressing a press conference here today, President of Natrang Balwant Thakur informed that the theater festival is first of its kind in the history of theater across the country.
"One set of actors would be performing in seventeen different plays based on seventeen different themes, the plays have been directed by eight different directors involving 125 actors and all are major productions of Natrang," added Thakur.
Giving information about the festival, Thakur said that Natrang would be staging five Dogri, eleven Hindi and one English play during the fifteen day long festival.
"The festival would open with the play "Bagia Banchha Ram Ki" which is a Hindi adaptation of a Bengali play written by Manoj Mitra and directed by Dr.Adil Hussain," added Balwant.
He said that other world famous plays like Ghumayee, Bawa Jitto, Maha Bhoj, and Andhon Ka Hathi would be staged thereafter.
"The noteworthy feature of this festival is that besides me, young directors like Mipham Otsal, Neeraj Kant, and Sanjeev Gupta have also directed the plays," said Balwant Thakur.
He said that a schedule has been drawn up for performances of the plays during the festival.
"A number of reputed artistes are taking part in the festival, those desirous of watching the plays would have to purchase a ticket which costs Rs.20 and be seated before 6 PM in the evening," informed Thakur.
Giving details of the achievements of Natrang in last 25 years, Balwant Thakur informed that the group has created a history in the theatre world with sheer dedication and commitment of its members, as during all these years Natrang group produced 85 world class plays, which were staged for over 1250 times in almost all the major theatre centers of the country.
He added that Natrang created history by introducing a Children's theatre wing in Jammu in which over 3000 children have been trained in Dramatics by Natrang.
Balwant Thakur said today Jammu was known all over the world in the field of theatre because of highly innovative and creative theatre works of Natrang.