Rangakarmee has made their founder Usha Ganguli proud not merely by attaining the major milestone of a golden jubilee (which several groups reach as a matter of time, without sustaining their former heights of creativity), but by continuing in her vigorous artistic footsteps under new leader Anirudh Sarkar. They have renovated their studio theatre into double-decker seating with a mezzanine gallery, yet her original vision of flexibility remains, so that when needed, instead of a fixed frontal viewing axis, performances can take place in the round or in any other unconventional layout.
They have also become a much younger team, featuring thirty-odd youths exhibiting a versatility of acting attested at their 50th-year festivities. This dynamism won national plaudits for Chandā Bedni at META 2025, reinforced by two productions on successive evenings at the festival: Pashmina and Ādhe Adhure. Anindita Pati and Shubham play the mourning old couple in Pashmina (photo), but she transforms into the rebellious schoolgirl and he the father’s misogynistic spokesman in Ādhe Adhure. Neha Birari and Sayan Surya Bhattacharya do the hilariously gauche Sikh pair in the former, but switch to the leading lady Savitri and her old flame in the latter. Megha Guha Roy enacts two distinctive daughters: the pashmina-seller’s responsible child and Savitri’s unhappily-married older girl. Om Tiwari performs the dead son in Pashmina and the sleazy boss in Ādhe Adhure. Backstage artists in the latter double as onstage extras in the former. All design the in-house costumes and makeup rather than outsource these to pros. The hallmarks of a truly multitasking repertory.
Pashmina by Mrinal Mathur, a relative newcomer to Hindi playwriting, is a moving simple-twist-of-fate drama in which the parents of a dead army captain go to Kashmir for a vacation, meet another holidaying couple there and shop for a shawl. I cannot reveal more. The director, Sajida Saji, had staged it for her own group based in Delhi and Imphal, reviving it for Rangakarmee in this must-see version underscoring communal humanism yet not falling overboard emotionally. As a script, it can do without the parents’ doctor friend displaced from Kashmir, because he does not add much to the story. Besides the impeccable acting referred to above, I must mention Anirudh Sarkar as the open-hearted shawl-seller and the participation of virtually every member of Rangakarmee in traumatic scenes of migration and colourful local dances, added to make the production full-length.
Rangakarmee’s latest, Ādhe Adhure, paid tribute to Mohan Rakesh in his centenary year. As a classic of Hindi drama, it demands careful treatment. Rakesh wanted one actor to portray all five men, which not only challenges that single thespian but also justifies Savitri’s crucial lines about masculinity: “You are all alike. Different masks but the face … exactly the same!” However, in order to give scope to as many of his talented actors as possible, director Anirudh Sarkar distributes the parts individually. The cast perform in character, particularly the dysfunctional family led by the distraught husband (Manoseej Biswas) and, apart from those named before, Ankit Sharma as his cynical son. But not everything in a classic needs retention—Sarkar must edit the now-superfluous explanatory prologue, and get rid of Rakesh’s chain-smoking among the males, which, inflicted on everyone, has absolutely no place in our cancer-conscious times.
Appropriately, Rangakarmee invited Beadon Street Subham’s dramatization of Ha-Ja-Ba-Ra-La to the celebrations, to take a bow as the farewell performance of their popular children’s fantasy. Director Anamitra Khan has literally grown up with it, training a host of child actors through it since it opened ten years ago. The final incarnation continued to entertain with Sukumar Ray’s immortal nonsensical creations, before its 36th and last show bid a fond adieu.
(18 February 2026)