The woman of 21st century is the enlightened source of immense power and artistic liberation. She has proved herself equally strong in all fields by her constant initiatives and committed willpower to bring a constructive change in the society.
Manjul Bharadwaj and team interact with audience
Still , a woman is being associated with the predefined roles established by the patriarchal society , cultures , families etc and therefore is in the search of her ” EXISTENCE ” that will define herself as a persona.
To rethink on this thought the Internationally renowned theatre thinker and initiator of ‘Theatre of Relevance’ Philosophy , MANJUL BHARDWAJ and his team were invited to the HOMI BHABHA CENTRE OF SCIENCE EDUCATION , Tata Institute of Fundamental Research , MUMBAI to churn and redefine the term “WOMAN”.
Theatre of Relevance process evolves the thinking of a person in a positive , constructive manner. It initially conceives the idea , churns the thought , breaks the static state of mind and inspires self to achieve a wider and clear understanding of the concept .The similar process was evolved in the institute of TIFR.
Manjul Bhardwaj’s creative and open interaction empowered the audience to ponder upon the cause for celebrating women’s day once in the year. The interaction with every person in the forum created a frequency of understanding the play ‘Main Aurat Hoon’ performed by the International performers Ashwini Nandedkar and Sayali Pawaskar and TOR practitioners Komal Khamkar and Tushar Mhaske at 4pm , on 8th of March 2017 , in TIFR . This performance resulted in an intellectual FEEDFORWARDS* processing session on what does the women meant to them.
(*Theatre of Relevance creates new words through understanding the concepts)
The process of evolving the feedforwards from the audience created a multi layered discussion.
The history pyramid of priest , kshatriyas and shudras is still being continued in today’s generation where women are suppressed , not supposed to take their own decisions. We pretend to portray her as a person but the reality has always described her as a property. After the performance the audience responded that liberated women are the symbols for generations whereas the fact of exploiting women has always being greater which cannot be denied. This play reconceptualized the traditional roles of the society , encouraging the audience to feel proud and happy to live as a women.
Manjul Bhardwaj stated ,” Savitribai Phule liberated herself conceptually to educate girls and emancipate women from being confined only to their physic. ” .This inspired one of the audience to ask a question to the writer and director of the play , Manjul Bhardwaj that what does a woman mean to him… For him a woman is a creator and is far beyond men , and whenever there is a call for change a woman initiates the journey of revolution. He also quoted that he does not deny the contribution and existence of men as he thinks that both are humans !!
The day concluded with the pledge initiated by Manjul with all the men promising themselves to encourage women to take their own decisions , hence liberating men on the International women’s day.