Habib Tanvir
Indian playwright, poet, and director, pioneer of a movement that sought to close and politicize the urbanrural divide in the arts. Joining the Indian People's Theatre Association a few years after its formation in 1943, he became aware of the vitality of ‘folk’forms,
particularly nacha and pandavani, which were native to the state of Madhya Pradesh in central India, where he was born and brought up (in Raipur). A multilingual artist, Tanvir has worked inUrdu, Hindi, and, most inventively, in Chhattisgarhi, the language spoken by the predominantly tribal group of actors who make up the Naya Theatre and with whom he has been associated since1958.
Even before his connection with Chhatisgarhi folk theatre, Tanvir wrote and produced the legendary Agra Bazar (1954). Earthy and replete with robust characters and the songs and cries of vendors in a bazaar, it was to become a classic of its kind, focusing on the writing, rather than the life, of the nineteenth-century Urdu poetNazir Akbarabadi. Another of Tanvir's famous productions, Mitti ki Gadi, a fluid adaptation of Sudraka's classic Sanskrit playMricchakatika (The Little Clay Cart), was conceptualized while he was touring Europe in 1956 -- 7, following his short stints as a student at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and the Old Vic Theatre School. Ultimately, however, Tanvir is remembered for one phenomenal production, Charanadas Chor, which continued to draw packed houses long after it was first produced in 1974. A somewhat Brechtian adaptation of a Rajasthani folk story, this play narrates the trials of a charismatic thief (chor), the representative of a common man, who makes good in spite of himself, and who ultimately gets entrapped within his own vows. While the Queen pressures him to lie, the thief remains true to himself and pays the price with his own life. Since its widely acclaimed international exposure at the Edinburgh Festival in 1982, Charanadas Chor has played all over the world and continues to be a favourite at Indian drama festivals. Tanvir has produced many other plays that question the complacency and corruption of post-independence India. Despite his nationwide status—he was for a time a member of the upper house of the Indian Parliament—Tanvir has not been able to consolidate the future of his group, which remains economically vulnerable.
By Vasudha Dalmia, Rustom Bharucha
