(From left) Ram Gopal Bajaj, former director of National School of Drama, New Delhi, along with Dr Santwana Bordoloi and Malaya Goswami release Nikhar Ragini Aru Anya Anya Natak, a book of plays by Jirsong Theatre Group, at Guwahati Press Club on Saturday. Picture by UB Photos

March 19: Leading publisher and theatre troupe, Anwesha, along with Jirsong theatre group today brought out a compilation of scripts of several well-known dramas, in an effort to provide assistance to theatre lovers.

Nikhar Ragini Aru Anya Anya Natak, a book of five plays, was released by Ram Gopal Bajaj, former director of National School of Drama and the winner of the Sangeet Natak award, at a function attended by theatre and literary personalities.

Of the five plays, three are translated from English and Thong Nokde and Ranpharpi Rangbe, two popular Karbi folktales, are written in Assamese by playwright Basanta Das. The English plays are The Dumb Waiter by Harold Pinter, La Musica by Margaret Durus and Riders to the Sea by John Millington Synge.

“Our experience in the Assamese theatre scenario has given us ample evidence that many a time theatre personalities face difficulties in the absence of literature,” said Robijita Gogoi, founder of Jirsong, and an alumnus of NSD. “The attempt here is to keep the scripts of the staged plays in a book form to help others to work on them.”

Echoing her, Bajaj said, “Although Assam has a long history of theatre culture, but there are very few books on plays and there is a dearth of books on translated plays.” He praised the initiative taken by the two theatre groups as theatre lovers will now get an opportunity to read scripts of plays from across the world in Assamese. The already functional website of the troupe, www.jirsongtheatre.org, was also formally inaugurated by Bajaj. The website gives a detailed account of the Assamese theatre scenario.

Some of the famous productions staged by the troupe at several national and international festivals including Bharat Rang Mahatsov, the annual NSD fest are Ranpharpi Rangbe based on the life of a rebellious Karbi woman, Dhruvaswamini, a historical play, The Dumb Waiter, Gaatha and the recent creation, Jatra Subha Hok.