Premchand's story 'Ghaswali' staged by Bihar Art Theatre on 31.7.2017 in Patna

Establishing women's grandeur of fidelity 

A drama-report by Hemant Das 'Him'

(इस रिपोर्ट को हिन्दी में पढ़ने के लिए यहाँ क्लिक कीजिये:  https://biharidhamaka.blogspot.in/2017/08/3172017.html)

Under the sponsorship of Culture Ministry of Bihar Governement, the 137th birth anniversary of Premchand was celebrated at Kalidas Rangalay, Patna by staging of two stories of Premchand on 31st July and 1st August, 2017. Premchand is still the king of Hindi stories and novels for the unparalleled depth of reality depicted by him about harshness of normal life of villagers in pre-independence era.  The first play 'Ghaswali' was played by Bihar Art theatre, Patna under the direction of renowned Arun Kumar Mishra and the second play 'Saut' was staged by 'Vistara' with Ujjwala Ganguli as it's director. 

Premchand still rules the whole realm of story making. The narration of the story 'Ghaswali' (Grass seller woman) is the one of the biggest testimony of this. Chain Singh is a high-caste man belonging to landlord class. Once his sight falls on Mulia, a young woman of cobbler caste. Chain Singh is spellbound by her charming youthfulness and makes advancement towards her in an usual manner befitting to a presumptuous high-caste man towards a low-caste beautiful young female. But Muliya snubs her. Chain Singh's shows a stance of a polite chivalrous man and pleads  for the sexual favour of Muliya. He says that he is ready to sacrifice his ego for the love of Muliya. Getting the hang of the inner feelings of Chain Singh, Muliya asks calmly whether he and she herself are not already married to someone else? Chain Singh says that he is not satisfied with his present wife with an insinuation that there is no harm if he asks for the love of another woman like Muliya.  Muliya again asks if some other man solicits for the love of your wife, won't you respond fiercely? Chain Singh has no answer and he feels ashamed. A wide-ranging exchange of dialogues follow and Muliya presents all plausible points in favour of woman preserving own chastity especially when her husband loves her so much.

After that day, Chain Singh is changed and becomes very well-disposed with all the labourer class people working under him. One day, when he goes to the Court he finds that Muliya is selling her pack of grass and talking with the men standing there in an undignified manner. he finds that Muliya herself is like making advancement towards the men around her and trying almost to seduce them just for selling the grass at a higher rate. Chain Singh is very depressed observing this. when he comes home and inquires then he comes to know that Mahavir, the husband of Muliya is not able to earn sufficient because his horse-carriage has not remained a preferred option for passengers in comparison with motor lorries. On this, he calls Mahavir and suggest him to work for him for an assured income of Rs. one daily so that his wife Muliya should not face any compulsion of going out and earning in an undignified manner.  Mahavir agrees happily. But Chain Singh puts a condition that Mahavir would not reveal this arrangement with him to Muliya. 

After some days Muliya comes running to Chain Singh and thanks him a lot. She says that her husband never keeps anything secret from her and so told everything  to her. She thanked Chain Singh from the core of her heart and asked whether he (Chain Singh) really believed that she was trying to allure people with her seductive gestures for her merry-making. Chain Singh replies that he never thought such as he had full confidence about her fidelity to her husband.

Arun Kumar Mishra showed his skill of presenting the true picture of a village of Premchand era and took out the maximum possible from the actors on the stage. All the actors lived their characters well on the stage. Ujjwala Ganguli as Muliya and Raj Patel as Chain Singh acted perfectly and presented the characters in their real form. Anita Kumari, Praveen Kumar, Ranvijay Singh, Aradhna Shree, Shanti Priya, Manish Singh, Nitish Priyadarshi, Abhishek Kumar, Shailesh Verma, Sushant Kumar, Abhishek Pandey, Rajiv Kumar, Hari Om Chandan, Ranjan Kumar and Abhinav also did justice with their respective characters.

Pradip Ganguli, Raj Kumar Verma, Ashok Ghosh, Madhukant Srivastavaa, Krishna Naidu, Hira, Birbal, Sanjay, Sanjiv Kr., Rajesh Kr., Gupteshwar Kumar Ashok Ghosh, Kumar Satyen and students of Bihar Natyakala Prashikshanalaya supported well from backstage.

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