An artiste performs at the theatre festival at Kalidas Rangalaya in Patna on Tuesday. Picture by Ashok Sinha

Patna, March 22: Youngsters of the state plunged into the celebratory mood of Bihar Divas by taking part in the Rashtriya Baal Rang Mahotsav, 2011 — the first-ever national-level theatre festival for children — in the state capital.

Organised by Kilkari, a unit of the state human resource development department, the three-day-long festival is being hosted on the premises of Kalidas Rangalaya.

Theatre groups from Patna, Saharsa and Begusarai will be taking part in the fest that was inaugurated today. Actors from New Delhi and Assam are also taking part in the thespian extravaganza. Children will also recite poems in the Baal Kavi Sammelan, scheduled on March 23.

Actors of Rang Toli — a unit of the National School of Drama, New Delhi — performed the first play in the festival, Kitabon ki Halchal. The narrative of the play revolves around the life of a school student and his likes and dislikes. An insect, who resides in a bookshelf, decides one day that it cannot live alone forever. He meets eight other insects and joins them in search for food.

With time, the group of insects start devouring books of various subjects on the shelves. But these insects inculcate the character of the subjects they eat, and start behaving accordingly. They get into an altercation to prove that their subject is the best. An old insect then convinces them that all subjects are equally good.

The play was directed by Abdul Latif Khatana and written by Alice Buster.

“Kitabon ki Halchal emphasises on the necessity of considering every subject important. Children usually get swayed by their favourite subjects and forget the relevance of other subjects. So we wanted to give them an insight through this play. It is a play about social integration,” said Kuldeep Singh, one of the actors in the play. He also said this production had been successful all over the country. It even got a great felicitation at the International Film Festival in Japan.

“Fine arts are products of the human souls. They are directly connected with god. So performing plays is a soulful act. It has a deep impact on our hearts as well as our brain,” said N. Vijayalakshmi, the director of ICDC.

Sanjay Upadhyay, a Patna-based theatre director, said: “Drama can evoke deep emotions in everyone. It becomes a medium to convey messages. Such plays help inculcate morals from an early age.”

Satish Anand, dean of the acting department of Asian Academy of Films and Television, said: “Children have unique talents. They just need to be given a stage.”