Jammu, June 16: Natrang presented a new Hindi play ‘Laadli’ written by Manjul Bhardwaj and directed by Neeraj Kant here on Sunday at Natrang Studio Theatre, Jammu under Natrang’s weekly theatre series ‘Sunday Theatre’. The play based on gender inequality, echoes the crying voices of countless unborn girls. Highlighting the Indian mindset and attitude towards girls, the play strongly advocates the celebration of the birth of the girl child and her life.
The play begins with the crying echo of a female fetus, where the girl in a embryo form establishes a dialogue with her mother and says, “O mother! Don’t kill me, I want to come into this world, want to see this beautiful world, don’t kill me.” In the next scene, a woman is forced to undergo an amniotic fluid test and is later forced to abort the pregnancy after discovering that the pregnancy is a girl. In this poignant scene, the father’s expression of his inability to raise dowry for the girl and his pleading that the grandparents’ lineage should not grow is presented very effectively. The girl’s grandfather talks about getting his son married for the second time. After this, the artists spread across the stage searching for girls and then educate audiences about the boy-girl ratio in different states of India.
After this, the girl in the female fetus talks to her parents, grandparents and the doctor and says that she should be allowed to be born, because nowadays girls are not weak, they are able to stand on their own feet after being educated, they can help their parents. Addressing the doctor, the girl says that your job is to give life, not to take it. Why do you want to kill me even before I am born? I want to live, I want to come into this world, don’t kill me. At last, the mother musters the courage to give birth to her child and all the actors sing and dance to express happiness and the play ends.
Natrang’s young actors who performed in the play included Priyal Gupta, Payal Khanna, Sanna Devi, Lalita Sharma, Kushal Bhat, Aadesh Dhar and Mehak Chib. Lights were operated by Neeraj Kant and the show was coordinated by Mohd. Yaseen.
