India-Pakistan Play Unites Grandmothers, Nations
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By Sunil Kataria
NEW DELHI (Reuters) - A Pakistani theater group has brought together two grand old dames of South Asian theater in a moving play – “A Granny for all Seasons” – about their divided lives for over four decades in India and Pakistan.
In a sign of recent improving relations on the subcontinent, Ajoka, a Pakistani troupe working for social change, traveled on the regular “friendship bus” linking the nuclear rivals to put on two shows in New Delhi this week. First staged in 1993, the play, “Aik Thee Nani,” centers on the lives of two sisters who play themselves on stage, ninety-two-year-old Indian actress Zohra Segal and her sister, Uzra Butt, 86, who migrated to Pakistan in 1960.
Director Madeeha Gauhar said the real life story tells the trauma of families divided by artificial boundaries and also tackles the politically sensitive issue of Pakistanis being forced to shed their cultural and historic links with India.
“A deliberate effort was being made to distance ourselves from our common culture and heritage,” Gauhar told Reuters.
The drama revolves around a “nani” (maternal grandmother) and a “dadi” (paternal grandmother) living very different lives.
Life changes when the elder Zohra visits Uzra and brings the winds of change into her conservative Pakistani home.
She becomes the champion of their grand-daughter, a girl who wants to be an actress but is afraid to say so in conservative Pakistan where acceptance of women performers is difficult.
The sisters created a sensation in British India for becoming actresses and dancers in the late 1930s when they worked with legendary theater and film personality Prithviraj Kapoor (news), patriarch of Bollywood’s Kapoor movie dynasty.
While Zohra became India’s theater and cinema favorite grandmother, Uzra migrated to Pakistan in 1960, leaving behind a successful theater career, and settled into domestic life.
Because of the strained relations between India and Pakistan since their bloody partition by the British in 1947, they were separated for several decades.
Uzra was overwhelmed at sharing the stage with her sister in the country of her birth for the first time in several years.
“It’s a very emotional journey. I was born here, I studied in Delhi – I am as much an Indian as Pakistani,” she said.
Zohra said politicians must take their cue from the public.
“We must accept Pakistan as good friends. We must become good neighbors,” she said.
Gauhar was encouraged by the Indian public’s response.
“I think the people are enjoying themselves and understanding the humor of the play and also the ironies in it,” she said.
Besides the sisters, the play also features their grand-niece, Samiya Mumtaz, who lives in the eastern Pakistani city of Lahore, and their Delhi-based niece, Salima Raza.
Sitting in the front row Thursday, Indian foreign minister Yashwant Sinha said the play was a step in the right direction.
“We will further intensify and further deepen the people-to-people contact,” he said.