File picture of a play being staged at Cassandra Theatre Festival.

Bhubaneswar, Sept. 4: The three-decade-old Cassandra Cultural Club of Keonjhar will stage 15 innovative short plays during the annual Cassandra Theatre Festival that will be organised this month.

The plays will be performed by well-known troupes from all over the country in the national and state-level segments of the festival.

The short play festival that will enter its 26th edition this year is organised annually by the Cassandra Cultural Club established in 1981.

To be held at the Keonjhar Town Hall, the festival will include seminars on theatre during the day while the performances will be staged in the evening. The six-day festival will host three plays every evening — one by a national troupe and two by participants from the state, said festival convener Jhadeswar Mishra.

“We had received 42 applications from over 20 districts of the state out of which our team of experts selected 10 scripts for the state-level play festival. All the plays are based on original scripts and need to be between 60 and 70 minutes,” he said.

Mancha Maya and Spandan from Rourkela, Dharmatma from Sambalpur, Bhawani Young Club from Khurda and others from Balangir, Cuttack, Puri and others are some of the troupes from the state that will stage short plays at the event.

Five troupes from all over the country have been chosen for the national theatre fest said Malay Mohapatra, the vice-president of the group.

“Bhopal based Rising Society of Art and Culture will stage Main Subhash Hoon, while Calcutta troupe Titli will stage Mahesh. Sanskriti, a troupe from Jamshedpur will present Shobha. The other two troupes will also present plays revolving around social and psychological issues,” said Mohapatra.

“We were the first troupe to start a short play festival in the state. Short plays are essential to promote and popularise theatre, since the script can be presented comprehensively and the viewers will not complain of sitting for long hours together,” Mohapatra said.

The festival includes 22 awards for the state-level competition with cash prizes worth Rs 25,000, Rs 15,000 and Rs 10,000 for the top three performances.

Actor Naseeruddin Shah and comedian Johnny Lever are the star attractions of the event.