Champaran’s story on stage

A set of Congress workers in Palakkad are preparing to celebrate the centenary of Mahatma Gandhi’s first satyagraha at Champaran district in northern Bihar by staging a play based on the farmers’ agitation.

The Champaran satygraha had lent a whole new dimension to the Independence movement.

Recreating the April 1917 event, the two-hour play will have around 24 Congress workers participating in it.

The first performance will be at the Government Chembai Memorial Music College auditorium for an invited audience at 5 p.m. on April 7.

The drama is being staged under the aegis of the district unit of Samskara Sahithy, cultural wing of Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC).

“It may be for the first time that amateur actors affiliated to the Congress party are attempting a stage version of a historical event, that too in a professional way. Spreading the message of Champaran assumes lot of significance in the present-day India because of the severe crisis in farming sector and the increasing number of farmers’ suicides,” Youth Congress leader Boban Mattumantha, who directed the drama, said.

The script has been written by K.V. Manoj Kalloor.

“We wish maximum number of venues for the drama that carries the message of farm crisis. It was after learning about the abuses suffered by the cultivators of Champaran that Gandhiji launched the satyagraha there. All the artistes of our theatre collective are from an agrarian background and they can easily relate to the century-old satyagraha and its significance,” Mr. Boban told The Hindu.

The farmers of Champaran were forced into growing indigo by British planters and estate owners.

The Champaran tenant, according to Gandhiji, was bound by the law to plant three out of every twenty parts of his land with indigo for his landlord.

This system was called Tinkathia.

Agrarian crisis

“Even now, agrarian issues rarely form part of the political discourse. Farmers are facing a lot of challenges, including land alienation and water scarcity. Indebtedness is another matter of concern,” said Mr. Boban, who has been with amateur theatre for long.