THE LIGHTING DESIGN BY Dr.C.RAVEENDRAN & S.VELAYOUDAME
The Bharat Rang Mahotsav (BRM) was started a decade ago by the National School of Drama in order to contribute to the growth and development of theatre across the country. From being an annual national festival that presented the most creative of recent work in India, it has grown into an international event, hosting theatre companies from around the world. It is today acknowledged as one of the largest theatre festivals of Asia – dedicated only to theatre – and is firmly established on the global theatre festival map. Over time it has evolved into an opportunity for audiences and students alike to enjoy and critically engage with the process and practice of the theatre arts as reflective of the issues and concerns of our troubled times. The play has been selected as one of the Tamil entry almost there are another fourteen play competed.
This play participated in the Bharat Ranga Mahotsav Theatre Festival-2010 and the performance of “Paari Padukalam” Directed by Mr.Pralayan was held on 12th January 2010 at Abhimanch Theatre, National School of Drama, New Delhi. Mr.Pralayan, Director and Freelancer has been assigned to direct “Paari Padukalam” as a production of a Department of Performing Arts, Pondicherry University under the financial support to meet the cost of production from the NSD (Regional Resource Centre, Bangalore) and the Department of Performing Arts.
Paari Padukalam is a historical play which tries to question a particular narrative of a grand Tamil past centered on the legend of empire building of the Cholas, Cheras and Pandyas. It seeks to espouse the alternative ethos of a tribal society led by another legendary king who goes by the name of Paari. Known in popular lore and in classical Tamil literature for his extreme qualities of charity, Paari is also portrayed as the independent leader of a tribal society that lived in the hills of Parampu, much to the annoyance of the empires. The source for this annoyance is not merely related to the acclaimed virtues of Paari as a 'giver' who never says no to anybody no matter what they ask or because of the way of life of the tribal society that lived in tandem with nature and not out of it. But the independence of that society went along with their low social status, living outside the margins of the high society, in the eyes of the ruling emperors. That such a lowly king could be the subject of so much praise by the poets irritates the stratified mainstream kingdom of the Chola king, who manages to bring together his own rivals, the Cheras and Pandyas in a war to destroy the tribal society and its King, Paari.
The play alternatively depicts the ethos of a non-stratified community of a hill tribe, their way of life, their love and respect for nature, a livelihood based on labour and a dignity arising out of a sense of equality in contrast to the court based rule of the Chola emperor and his ways of patronage and politics underpinned by a society that was already stratified as high and low. When the itinerant singers and balladeers extol the virtues of Tamil as a grand unifying political force, the politics of high and low as practiced by the empire would rather choose identities of the social on unequal terms than language. Language fails to stop the war. Language fails to bridge two worldviews, one espousing a dream of a world based on equality and the other based on inequality and identities. Murdered on the battlefield, the dying tribal king raises pertinent issues on the politics of the empire, identity and language.
