The festival titled Swapna O Drohoer Jatiyo Natyautsab is still in full swing on its sixth day. Educational institutes from outside Dhaka staged six plays at the three venues of Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy
despite the strike on Tuesday.
Organisers claim that the ongoing national theatre festival at the Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy has been a massive success.
‘In the middle of continuous strikes, vandalism, limitation of space and time, the festival is going on smoothly. No troupe has missed their schedule till date,’ said, Liquate Ali Lucky, director general of BSA.
Claiming the festival a great achievement the DG said, ‘With a limited fund of only taka 20 Lakh, we have successfully organised a national festival that includes the educational institutes and district branches from across the country.’
‘A big number of volunteer and technical hands are working behind this event which made it easy to go on despite the obstacles’, he added.
The festival featured 64 theatre plays from 64 districts. The plays were based on rebellion against British colonial government, Liberation war of 1971 and some contemporary social issues like religious fundamentalism and secularism.
All those plays were written by individual playwrights of 64 districts. BSA started working on this event from January 2013 and they successfully executed it within four months. All the selected directors were given one day orientation according to the organisers.
‘Basically we are inspiring the local theatre artistes by giving them a platform to perform at a national level’, Lucky added.
The organisers consider limitation of venues as the factor behind this eight-day festival.
Sara Ara Mahmud, Director of Film and Theatre department, said, ‘Day-long festival takes place in developed countries but that’s not possible here. That’s why we scheduled our festival in eight days, considering the number of limited theatre halls that we have’.
-With New Age input