A scene from Meenkanya. Picture by Sanjoy Chattopadhyaya

Guns, barbed wires, security forces and governments have failed and the poor continue to suffer on both sides of the border. While a flood of news on girl-trafficking reaches our local media on a daily basis, Bangladesh, from where most girls are trafficked, remains worse hit.

This issue propelled Bangladesh Institute of Theatre Arts (BITA) to bring to audiences on this side of the border the stark problem of trading of girls.

A Chittagong-based NGO, BITA, promoting myriad social agenda for long, was in town earlier this week with its show Meenkanya, sponsored by the US embassy, Dhaka, and supported by city theatre personality Bibhash Chakroborty.

?A lot of editorial and cultural platforms have talked about girl-trafficking across the Bengal-Bangladesh border. Yet, there has hardly been any improvement in the situation as the rural masses remain unaware and authorities nonchalant. We hope the Indian and Bangladeshi governments actually put a bilateral treaty down on paper and arrange for official repatriation of trafficked girls,? said project ideator Shishir Dutta.

The play traces the story of Alal Sardar, a trafficker who marries girls in Bangladesh villages and sells them in Calcutta for a high price. In Meenkanya Alal weds Jyotsna, luring her with promises of comfort and happiness of a ?home in Salt Lake?. On their way back across the border, Alal finds his long lost love Manjela being held captive before being sold off by another trafficker, this one a bangle-seller. Both girls die tragic deaths while Alal is caught between his love Manjela, whom he does not want sold and his ?wife? Jyotsna, whom he plans to sell.

Kankan Das, principal of a school in Chittagong, who plays Jyotsna, said: ?You and I can never feel the pain these girls go through.?

Zarin Kulsum, assistant director and actor, said: ?We plan to take this production to rural locations all across Bengal and Bangladesh, because that is where it will actually make sense. This is also the reason why the entire production is loosely adapted on the lines of a jatra or pala gaan, sources of entertainment villagers are used to.?

Indeed, the production makes use of simple props such as masks, oil lanterns, ribbons and picture-painted cardboard or cloth backdrops, while most of the cast of 14 play more roles than one.

The Calcutta stage is fine, but for BITA member Bappa Choudhury who plays Alal Sardar, and Jayashree Kar, who plays Manjela in Meenkanya, a rural setting would be the real platform for change.