Bhubaneswar, June 16: The villain’s booming voice was a bit muted and the heroine’s curses less colourful, but that was only a small compromise that jatra made to make its journey from rural pockets to the heart of the city.

The sophisticated crowd’s style of appreciation on Exhibition Ground was quite different from the high-decibel applause at the Khandagiri jatra festival or at any rural tour.

Yet, at this jatra fest, held to woo the urban crowd, one similarity was enough to bring smiles to the organisers’ face. The house was as jam-packed as it is anywhere else.

Jatra company owners and artistes wanted to pull the urban viewers to home-grown operas through this festival that concluded last week.

Viewers from the elite class of the city responded with equal enthusiasm and were seen in large numbers among the audience. Eight leading jatra troupes showcased their productions at the festival hosted by local cultural organisation Prayas. The event organisers gave special care and attention to the arrangements to ensure that the urban guests felt comfortable and enjoyed their jatra experience.

Usually, jatras begin around midnight and continue till early morning. But to make it convenient for the urban crowd, the shows here began by 7pm and ended by 11pm.

“We aimed at bringing the intellectual and educated urban audience to jatra and hence ensured that the timing suited them. It was good to see the schedule work as there were many office-going viewers who would come down after their daily shift at office,” said organiser Banamali Mohanty, a lawyer.

Autorickshaws were given free tickets by the organisers, so that they hang around till the show ended and the viewers could hire them to return home. Every day, 2,000 viewers enjoyed the shows.

“I had thought that jatras would be melodramatic but the social messages made an impact. I loved the dedication of the artistes and the professional arrangements on the stage, be it lighting, sound, stage designing or costumes of the artistes,” said software engineer Chandan Pradhan.

Homemakers too took advantage of the festival timings and venue to watch the jatra shows.

“To me, jatra is an adventure. Since it was organised in the heart of the city for the first time and at convenient timings, it was really comfortable for our group of friends to be here,” said Manisha Patnaik, a medical aspirant who lives in a hostel at Kharavela Nagar.

There were also special washrooms for men and women as well as parking.

Jatra has been the most successful entertainment enterprise in the state with around Rs 50 crore turnover if one considers the business of major troupes. Though some annual shows are organised at Khandagiri and Saheed Nagar, the timing has always been awkward for the working urban populace. This was the first attempt to attract this segment.

Most sought after troupes such as Shivani Gananatya, Baghajatin, Kalinga Gananatya, Sachidananda, Biswa Rangamahal, Konark, Eastern Blue and Eastern Red staged shows at the festival.

Usually, jatra tickets are priced at Rs 60 to Rs 80. But here, the tickets were priced higher, at Rs 100 a person.

“We spent Rs 14 lakh to host the fest and recovered Rs 7 lakh. But we are happy that we have succeeded in creating a new segment of jatra viewers,” said Mohanty.

The Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation, the Odisha Industrial Infrastructure Development Corporation and many private companies supported the event. Every day, the viewers got a chance to interact with the artistes. The actors, however, had mixed reactions about the experience.

“We had to tone down our style to suit the crowd and though there was applause, it was nowhere close to the raucous cheers we get from rural crowds. Yet, this experience is important to take jatra a step ahead,” said Sanjay Bal, who played a villain in Baghajatin’s show.

Their hero, Bapi Panda, who has been in jatra for 17 years, said the feedback from an audience that had seen theatre and a wide range of films, mattered for him as an actor.

“They were quiet and that let me know they were involved in the scene,” he said.

Rajendra Mohanty, a manager of a participating jatra troupe, said: “The crowd was so well-behaved that we did not need any security arrangements or police intervention which usually happens during jatras at villages,” he said.

Though the troupes have promised to come back to their new viewers time and again, there is a feeling among a set of artistes from different opera houses that urban viewers may lose interest if jatra festivals were hosted frequently in the city.

“Rural viewers can enjoythe same emotions, the same dialogues and even the same play a hundred times, whereas the urban crowd gets bored easily. So, we must not be as frequent to stage shows in the city, so that this new set of viewers stays hooked,” said an artiste.