Directing a play at Tihar 1

This was a special experience. I was still at JNU waiting for my viva for my dissertation to be over and done with. ( I still feel my dissertation could be quite special if I had applied myself a little more, but I was doing quite a few things, and as a very celebrated professor at the university had told me, 'Himanshu, originality is good, but it is not enough, research means, rigour with regularity', I realised that there was very little time to do anything else, leave alone theater which consumed a lot of time. And academics especially research needed me to be consumed by it at that time which I wasn't able to do despite all my attempts and efforts to move away from theater, I almost always got involved in it, somehow there was no escape, but more on this later) 

In those days, we still had landline phones, mobile telephony had come to India but it wasn't that accessible. So, I got a phone at the hostel landline number. It was from Mr Arun Kapur. He asked me what I was upto and I told him that I was waiting for my viva to be fixed. He called me over to the school ( he was leading Vasant Valley school at that time, I had worked there for a while looking after drama and debates) Mr Kapur asked me to get into his car as the school ended, which I did. And then we drove for a long time, all the way to Tihar prison complex and specifically to jail number 5 which housed the younger inmates ( I think from ages 16 to 21) Under the aegis of 'Ritinjali' , the NGO run by him, he used to work with the inmates when he got free from the school!

 But I had nothing to do with the nature of work. When the car entered the jail, I asked him why was I there. And he said, there is some work that needs done with the inmates. 

Soon I was inside the jail and working with a group of the inmates on a Bhishm Sahni play on the life of 'Bhagat Singh'. It was an interesting thought to introduce the life of the revolutionary to the young people who got caught up in a cycle of crime and violence. Getting engaged in doing the play could truly be inspirational. The play was being published by NBT and Bhisham Sahni himself was going to be there to watch the play. 

There was pressure there! For some reason I had decided that I will get this done. But I had to get the group to be inclined to work with me and on a play leading to a series of experiences. Will write about my first day there in an upcoming post.