Hindi theater groups entertains with social commitment
Dhoop Chaoon, a Hindi theatre group based in Atlanta, showcased plenty of talent on May 3rd at White Hall in front of a full house. Under the leadership of Sandhya Bhagat, 65 participants portrayed their given characters well. All the plays and musical dramas contained a lot of humor, meaningful messages and withheld the strong motto of the group: Save Hindi!
Tanishq Jain and Maha Farooqui, two youngsters and the most senior member of the group, Mrs. Sudarshan Bahri, began the show. There was a slide show about the previous program and the hard work of the team members. Aslam Parvez and Manju Tiwary were the emcees of the evening.
The first item named ’Dhoop Chaoon’, depicted the different stages of life with three beautiful songs. It was acted by Bimal Pathak, Neema Patel, and the duos of Tarana Vij and Khagesh Pathak and Adya Khanna and Neelank Pathak.
This was followed by a patriotic song by Suparna Pathak, Jyoti Prakash, Vandana Tantya, Gurupdesh Bedi, Adya Khanna, Neelank Pathak. Music for this song was composed by Rajan Sharma and Vijay Tandon and sung by Syam Tiwari, Tripta Sharma, Anil Bhagat and Suparna Pathak.
‘Mobile phone vendor,’ was another good performance which showed how people take to advancing technology without any creative thinking. Actors in this play were Vikas Khanna and Kamlesh Chugh. This was followed by a pilgrimage to the City of Banaras; in the form of a dance drama based on a song from the movie, “Laga Chunari mein Daag.” This dance drama was superbly performed by Emily Polokoff, Adrita Khanna, Dolly Patel, Neha Saxena, and Laxmi Chandrasekhar.
“Nakkal Karo Lekin Akkal Se” with actors Paresh Jain, Renu kumar, Tanishq Jain, Shaaz Osmani, and Tauseef Choudhary, showed how we tend to forget our traditions and adapt to an alien culture because we think of it as modern. This script was written by Sandhya Bhagat.
The next item was the show stealer called the ‘Bhains.’ This was an excellent adaptation of an old Bollywood number by Shammi Kapoor - “Meri Bhains Ko Danda Kyon Maara.” This was very well choreographed with Manojkumar Govind as Bhains and Vijay Gaur as the farmer and Shaaz Osmani as the owner. The body language of the actors was commendable.
The next item “Coffee with Roma” was also well received. This play, with lot of humor, symbolized the nonsense aspect of Bollywood through interviews performed by Manju Tiwari and Khagesh Pathak. The emphasis was on the importance given to the Hindi language by Bollywood actors in their off screen life.
Following this was a Kawwali; presented in a very pleasant way. Performers were Rajan Sharma, Vijay Tandon, Talat Alvi, Tripta Sharma, Vinay Khanna, Asif Farooqui, Veena Katdare, Renu Kumar, Gurupdesh Bedi, Manjit Bedi, Nihit Tiwari, Hema Jain and Kamlesh Chugh. The old concept of a Kawwali was well translated to a new approach by Sandya Bhagat.
The next play was adapted by Sandhya Bhagat based on a story by K. P. Saxena. Actors were superb in this play and well casted. The main character “Nayan Sukh” was performed by Manojkumar Govind. His sound control and acting the part of a blind person, was memorable and well applauded by the audience. Vijay Gaur as Sarathi and Anuj Jain as the Doctor were excellent. The supporting cast members were Neema Patel as the mother, Seema Saxena as the wife, Tarana Vij as the sister, and Sandhya Bhagat as the narrator.
“Jamoora & Ustaad” – the next item had Navin Tyagi (Ustaad) and Asif Farooqui (Jamoora) on stage to taunt the Desis about or habits in this American life. This skit was written by Sandhya Bhagat.
The next play was “Garh Barh Jhalla.” This play carried a very strong message about saving the Hindi language. The script written by Sandhya Bhagat was phenomenal and all the actors poured their hearts into it. Paresh Jain, Dolly Patel, Emily Polokoff, Laxmi Chandrasekhar, Veena Katdare, Adrita Khanna, Jyoti Dandona, Manojkumar Govind, Tripta Sharma and Sandhya Bhagat each did their best to convey that we need to have a common language other than English.
The next topic was Holi. The story of Holi was acted out by Khagaesh Pathak as Hiranyakashyap. Following this was a dance performance by Tarana Vij and Rafiq Batcha based on the song from old Bollywood movie ”Navrang”. All participants then joined in to play Holi.
Madhav Katdare, Asha Kumar, Sadaf Farooqui, Chinti Baali, Bimal Pathak and Vijay Tandon were thanked for their back stage help. Anil Bhagat and Gandharv Bhagat were excellent in their roles as coordinators.
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