Noted theatre troupe Padatik Bangladesh celebrated its 40th founding anniversary at the National Theatre Hall of Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy (BSA) on January 20.
Members of the troupe brought out a colourful rally with musical instruments to express their jubilance. Apart from displaying their illustrious journey through photographs of plays and various documents, the programme also included renditions of solo and choral songs, poetry recitations and dance performances by noted artistes and organisations.
Along with celebrating their anniversary, the theatre troupe also conferred this year's winners of “Kachi Memorial Award” on eminent thespian Aly Zaker (theatre), Nargis Chowdhury (music), late advocate M. Sirajul Islam Khan (jurist) and Kazi Ebadul Haque (former justice).
Padatik Bangladesh initiated the “Kachi Memorial Award” in 2006 and conferred the award on two categories – “Culture” and “Law and Social Welfare”. The award was named after one of Padatik Bangladesh's founding members, the late Abu Muhammad Murtayish Kachi, who died of a heart attack on September 13, 2002. Murtayish, also the former consultant of World Bank's Legal and Judicial Capacity Building Project, performed in several plays with the troupe including “Kobor”, “Sojon Badiyar Ghat”, “Tin Rustomer Goppo” and “Ballavpurer Rupkatha”. He was also the organising secretary of the Bangladesh Group Theatre Federation.
The award and anniversary programme started in the evening with Cultural Affairs Minister Asaduzzaman Noor as chief guest, while Professor Abdus Selim, Vice President of ITI Bangladesh Centre; General Secretary of Sammilito Sangskritik Jote Hasan Arif, Presidium Member of Bangladesh Group Theatre Federation Jhuna Chowdhury; General Secretary of Bangladesh Path Natok Parishad Ahmed Gias and Kazi Ebadul Haque were present as special guests in the programme. Team leader of Padatik Bangladesh Selim SH Chowdhury delivered welcome address at the event.
The guests, on behalf of the troupe, also handed over anniversary celebration mementos to Padatik's Bangladeshi and Indian friends. A total of 16 Bangladeshi members -- Golam Sarwar, Kamruzzaman Runu, Golam Kuddus, Fahim Hossain Chowdhury, Mamunul Haque, Abdul Wadud, Shamsul Alam Bokul, Masum Reza, Babul Biswas, Irin Parveen Lopa and Nasirul Haque Khokon -- along with nine Indian personalities including Amitava Bhattacharjee, Dipankar Bardhan Roy, Manab Dey, TK Sengupta, the late Kamalesh Sengupta and Atin Sengupta were given mementos.
Later, members of Padatik Sangeet Sangshad Bangladesh joined the theatre activists of Padatik Bangladesh in staging a collage performance of their popular plays –“Sojon Badiyar Ghat”, “Ma”, “Chandrabati”, “Poramati”, “Khetmojur Khoimuddin”, “Shey” and “Jalbalika”.
