Manipuri Theatre festival in Sylhet

Manipuri Theatre, located at a very remote village of Ghoramara of Kamalganj upazila in Moulvibazar has now become an example of theatre excellence of Bangladesh, for their outstanding stage performances over 20 years.

The group is now celebrating their 20th anniversary, with a month-long theatre festival at Natmandap the group's studio hall at the village, where prominent theatre troupes of Bangladesh will be staging their plays.

The festival began with Manipuri Theatre's "Kahe Birangana", a play by Michael Madhushudan Dutta directed by Shuvashis Sinha, on October 27.

Next, Dhaka Theatre staged "Binodini" of Selim Al Deen and Simon Zakaria, directed by Nasiruddin Yousuff on October 28; Mahakal Natya Sampraday staged "Nilakhyan" extracted from Kazi Nazrul Islam's writing by Anan Aman and directed by Yousuf Hasan Arko on November 4 and Theatre staged "Mukti" of Lee Blessings directed by Tropa Majumder on November 11.

Manipuri Theatre also presented "Leima" by Federico Garcia Lorca directed by Shuvashis Sinha on November 5 and "Shree Krishna Kirtan" of Baru Chandidas directed by Shuvashis Sinha on November 12.

The festival will end on November 26 with the play "Dewan Gazir Kissa" or "Naam-Gotrohin: Mantor Meyera" by Nagorik Natya Sampraday. SM Solaiman's play 'Golapjan' by Theatre Art Unit will be staged on November 18 and "Circus Circus" by Pracyanat on November 25.

Manipuri Theatre will also stage 'Ingal Andhar Pala' on November 19 and 'Debatar Grash' on November 24, both directed by Shuvashis Sinha.

Veteran theatre director Nasiruddin Yousuff of Dhaka Theatre, who inaugurated the festival, said: "The theatre festival is incomparable to any other festival I have seen in my 40- year theatre career. We are very pleased by the humble invitation of the group and thrilled to perform on the stage of Manipuri Theatre's Natmandap."

"The tribal village of the Manipuris has their own culture and they showed us how to love theatre," said the veteran theatre director.

About the festival, Shuvashis Sinha of Manipuri Theatre said, "It is our pleasure to invite reputed theatre troupes to our humble home of theatre in this remote village, but we feel proud as they accepted our invitation and staged their plays on the clay theatre stage of Natmandap."

"We are also pleased by the theatre lovers who travelled afar to visit our Natmandap for the festival and they made us proud, signifying that theatre has no barriers of territory," he said.