“…seta luga lagaeka taruniharu bato ma ubinxan, ma jasta jiuda Bokshi haru badnaam raat haru sanga rukhharu chaharxan, birala, kukur, gai, bakhra haru sanga kura garxan, ani…”
We have heard about all kinds of horrible violences against women occurring all over the nation. Child marriage, sexual assault, witch allegation; all kinds of such horrible evils have taken place in our country for quite some time now with women as the major victim. Mandala Theatre’s new play ‘Bokshi ko Ghar’ illustrates all these problems, with a vivid presentation that will be on your mind for quite some time.
The monologue-play performed by Sarita Giri has a unique charm of its own that makes many of the audience connect with the storyline of the play. Written and directed by Sulakshyan Bharati, the play describes the story of a girl forced into child marriage, suffering from sexual assault and alleged as a witch. This monologue-play has been further brought to life by light and sound effects controlled by Dipal Baral, Aditya Kotwal, and the director, Sulakshyan Bharati himself.
The monologue was truly a work of art, especially due to realistic expressions and dialogues from Sarita Giri. The story depicts the current situation of woman violence collectively that occurs in rural areas. “We often meet Bokshis in various columns of different newspapers,” says Mr. Bharati. “This story is just a collection of such stories. A while back, we see a lot of child marriage, because people believed that girls marrying during 8 or 9 years old, had heavenly fate. This play tries to describe these girls’ emotions and feelings, as best as we can capture and throw it out in the world, for all to see,” he adds.
Sarita Giri’s quick expression and tone changes quickly and captures the audience’s attention. From beginning to the end, the audience had the rapt attention of Giri’s performance, lulled by her personality changes as she jumped and thoroughly displayed four different characters in their own way. Upon being asked about the difficulty of staging such a long play, alone, she replied, “Of course it was difficult. Especially during the rehearsals, when jumping from characters to characters, but rehearsing the same play, it has been a bit easier to perform after this 1 month, then at the beginning.”
This is the second play from Sulakshyan Bharati, writer of the much acclaimed play ‘Bill Gates Pandit’. In a question about his recent transformation from an actor to a director, he simply says, “I was an actor, I still am, and will always be one. This play that I designed, presents all my thoughts and I felt that acting and directing is same for me, without any difference at all. It feels like it is me performing on the stage itself and not Sarita.”
Upon a question on her satisfaction in her performance, Giri says, “Frankly speaking, I am never sure. After all, each act helps to polish my previous performance. So I sometimes feel like I did a good job, while other times, it feels like I was not up to my potential. Today, I am happy though.” Mandala’s current batch’s student, Anil Adhikari says, “I feel hyped by her performance. When such actress like Sarita sister performs, it gives us hope that we can perform similarly in coming future. I was really happy with the number of audiences and am now completely excited to perform my parts in plays that come in the future.â€
Written and Directed By: Sulakshyan Bharati
Cast: Sarita Giri
Duration: 45 minutes
The play is currently being performed at Mandala Theatre, Anamnagar and runs till 28 August (except Mondays), 5:15pm (additional show on Saturdays 1:00 PM).
By Atul Bhattarai
The writer is an A-Level graduate from Xavier International College and is currently doing his internship at Glocal Khabar.
