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While most artists boast of their artistic credentials and refrain from making political statements, Kolkata-based eminent theatre person Usha Ganguli has no qualms in admitting, "I am a very political person". Of course, her political consciousness has nothing to do with any political party or isms. Except humanism. She believes in the right to life and education. In her fight against oppression, her thinking is affected by humanitarianism on the same lines as Prem Chand, Manto and Tagore.
This is not surprising since most of her plays make emphatic statements on socio-political relevant issues, be it religion, the regressive caste system or, more recently, on drug addiction and rehabilitation. She is toying with writing a play on sexual abuse. She has finished creating Manushi, based on four of Tagore’s works. She feels equally strongly about women’s issues. However, while she admits there is a strong feminine presence that defines the work of women directors, she hates to be clubbed as one. "For don’t we deal with issues other then women?" So she who has participated in 38 theatre festivals fails to fathom the rationale, behind women’s theatre festivals, "except condescension and treating women as inferior." More so since she feels that these hardly allow space for women directors to discuss and collaborate with each other. Being a woman director, anyway, she asserts is not easy. In Kolkata, where there is no Hindi theatre, she has to constantly compete with Bengali theatre and there is a deliberate attempt to sideline her. Still this ziddi aurat has managed to hold her ground for over three decades. A trained Bharatnatyam dancer and professor of Hindi, her first foray into theatre began with theatre group Anamika who cast her as Vasantsena in Mitti Ki Gaadi. Thereafter she felt the need to start her own group. For years, she invited directors from outside to wield the directorial baton. Till one day as she could see the complete theatre map on her mindscape, she stepped into the shoes of the director. In her very first play Mahabhoj, which was a stupendous success, she had to deal with 55 actors. Since then she has not looked back and grown from strength to strength. Her 36-year-old group today has over 90 actors and over 40 plays have been staged by the group from Delhi to Dacca, Mumbai to Frankfurt. And all this while, her credo has been, "No compromise with script, discipline and dedication." A stern director, she says unflinchingly, "My group is not a club or a getaway where youth can come for romancing." Over the years, she has earned the reputation of a no-nonsense go-getter who has optimised the possibilities of design and space. Design is a natural fallout of her dancing skills. "Space", she observes "always challenges me." From a garage to rooftops, from town halls to open-air auditoriums, Usha has transformed all conceivable spaces. Now she is excited about making a studio theatre, "even though I have no money." The economics of theatre perturbs her. She rues, "There is little sponsorship for meaningful theatre. Look at the glaring discrepancy. While English theatre and star-studded productions are given an astronomical fees running in lakhs, we have to make do with meagre amounts, Rs 40,000 at best." And it’s this anomaly and other dynamics of theatre that she would discuss in her autobiography that she will soon be writing. Is it likely to raise the hackles of others? She shoots back, "I don’t believe in washing dirty linen in public." Will we get to meet the person in her? She nods otherwise. But then with her only son settled in Delhi, theatre is her family, the extended kutumb. Even otherwise, where theatre begins and when the person takes over`85.matters not. For in her lexicon, life is theatre and vice versa, each not only rubbing off on the other, but also enriching each other.
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Woman of many hues 