The Shakespeare of Dalit
 |
| Mahendra Malangia |
Having written 35 plays, he is known as Shakespeare. However, the
only similarity is the same number of plays what Shakespeare has in account. He
has written special things about common mass whereas Shakespeare wrote common
things about special people. Mahendra Malangia is one of the milestones of
modern theater of Mithila, a cultural region depicting the sensibilities of
people from Bihar and South Nepal. A farmer and teacher from a small
multi-caste village, Malangia is devoted for theater as to advocate the
oppressed and disadvantaged wings of society.
Like other parts of India, Mithila is also a highly
cast-ridden society where ruthless differences can be seen in every walk of
life; not only among people and customs but also in language as Maithili being
the mother-tongue is categorized according to particular caste. If talking
about arts, the region has witnessed the evolution of Mithila (Madhubani)
painting and the development or degradation of various arts & crafts forms
such as Sujni, Siki, Khatwa, Manjusha, folk music& dance, Vidyapati Sangeet
etc. Mithila too had the rich classical theater in Sanskrit & Maithili
before 15th century which was later replaced by the lively folk
theater practiced by untouchables.
The early modern Maithili theatre practitioners
initiated a theater for upper casts mostly influenced by the classical theater
where the subjects discuss the life of either gods, positioned at the top of
the god’s hierarchy or the people belong to the upper levels of the society.
Side-by- side, the lower casts carried on with folk theater, their own gods
(Dalit gods), people and language. Ironically, there was no way of mingling the
two streams of theater as the intellectuals (almost all belong to the upper
casts) always believed in either the former group or in ‘no theater for
civilized society’.
Here came few daring and pioneering men, who took the
oath to change the discourse by creating dialogues between the two opposite
sections of society, Malangia was one of them. Now it is possible for one to
observe the 5, 000 to 10, 000 couple of eyes watching some painted moving
characters in a remote village of Bihar when the dark night stares at a lighted
stage and enjoys ‘the saga of untold and the voices of unheard’. Malangia has
crafted this magic in which the sons of oppressors portray the sons of
oppressed with the genuine feelings and in their alleged crude or uncivilized
language.
This new form of theater is a tribute to
ever-neglected, downtrodden wing of society; well- written and well-performed
by groups consisting members from diverse castes, religions and nationalities.
The effective combination of realistic themes & styles with indigenous
taste illustrate the untouched subjects such as the life of underprivileged,
human relationship, contemporary picture of rural and semi-urban life,
outstanding story design & dialogue and a theatre of all three generation
in terms of aesthetics, thought and presentation style. The standard of
creation & entertainment at the least resources develop low cost theater, a
demand of time and situation.
