Watle Hote Kahi Mail / Himanshu Smart

Himanshu Smart is a Marathi playwright, poet and theatre director living in Kolhapur. His plays are dramatic reflections on contemporary middle-class realities. Drawing from everyday concerns and activities, his plays are structured in a realistic form. Nevertheless, the element of spontaneity provides them with an interesting dramatic turn. Building on complexities in human nature, family relationships and day-to-day conversations in a globalized world, Smart’s play like Watale Hote Kahi Mail offers multiple perspectives on nuanced social realities, institutionalized systems, contradictory ideologies and concerns of an individual. Some of his other plays are Perfect Mismatch, Triple Seat, Maun and Pradarshan. 

Watle Hote Kahi Mail (2017), a Marathi play in two acts by Himanshu Smart, revolves around three characters namely Sujay, Aruna and Manus (person). It is written from the perspective of a ‘person’ Sujay with an urge to murder someone. Sujay, around thirty to thirty-five years old, is, in his own words, 'a simple, normal, married common man’, and, Aruna, a twenty to twenty-two years old talented college girl, is studying human cells. Sujay wants to take the first-hand experience of killing someone. He has captured and grounded Aruna to interpret his killer instinct with her help. However, he is unsure of murdering her. Instead, what is more pressing to Sujay is to understand: ‘Why am I obsessed with the act of murdering someone?’ Introducing himself Sujay tells: “I’m not a serial killer nor do I want to rape you; I am not even a mentally disturbed individual. Genuinely, I am a common man. A very normal and healthy…(Suddenly stops). Should I say ‘individual’ or ‘human being?’; that’s the confusion. But the thing is, I am normal. (laughs)….I earnestly need to know the meaning of this urge to murder! Aruna is oblivious to all this and she is confused about whether to trust Sujay and her confusion scares her. Act 1 ends with the suggestion of the third character of ‘Manus’ with the knocking sound creating the dramatic turn. 

Act II begins with the new character relieving the stressed atmosphere built towards the end of the earlier act. The play shifts its perspective to Manus and his involvement becomes visible in the drama. Played in the reality show anchoring style, Manus keeps watching the movements of Sujay and Aruna. The play reaches the turning point with the dramatic performance of Manus visualized in a reality show form.

Sujay and Aruna remain engaged in lively conversations and playing games within an enclosed space. Through the conversation, on the one hand, Sujay expresses his despair over the vicious cycle of birth-hardship-progress-development-arrogance-war-destruction. On the other hand, Aruna presents her personal reflections derived from her in-depth analysis of human cells simultaneously provoking existential questions. Aruna who kept on opposing Sujay now gets enveloped in the unknown fear with the entry of the third character. It compels her to seek Sujay’s support. In effect, they team up against the intruder, Manus. After some time, she is further confused by the third person’s involvement. In the end, the three of them become each other’s opponents. Amidst everything, Sujay and Aruna experience the ever-growing feeling of being manipulated by others.

Some of the conversations between the three characters are indeed witty, sharp and appealing. The dialogues and their colloquial nature complement the character development set within the weird middle-class spaces. How do everyday conversations impact human lives? Different people, things, communication mediums, capitalism and all these control our thought processes and decision-making capacities. The play takes forward idea of people being manipulated and raises existential concerns.

Sujay has the genuine urge to murder someone and wishes to pursue it. However, media, family and social limitations are hurdles in his pursuit. He doesn’t want any disturbance from his family or the police. In addition, Manus capitalizes on Sujay’s urge and makes both of them follow him since they are trapped in the popular reality show. The play gives the realization that none of our actions can remain private. We can’t control them. The entire world watches us. It's globalization. Watale Hote Kahi Mail is a drama about globalization and the individuals trapped in it. They can’t express themselves freely. Citing examples of forms of communication such as mobile, e-mail, Google Earth etc. from the early 2000s, the playwright presents the effects of globalization and how it has pervaded our personal spaces and manoeuvred human thinking processes. Through the form of the newly emerged reality-show programmes on television mimicked by the middle-aged Sujay and the ambitious Aruna, the play presents the iconic processes of globalization. 

Watale Hote Kahi Mail effectively presents a captivating story about human beings indulging in the modern amenities and technical devices. But, still, there is loneliness and there are restrictions on their free-thinking. Once it is established that all characters are lonely in their respective worlds, they share their personal stories that inform their family background. However, after a point, the play doesn’t complicate these matters. The concerns raised in the play are not taken forward effectively in the later part of the development. To release the tension created by the urge to murder someone, catchy dialogues are introduced. But, dialogues turn out to be verbose and break the continuity of the story. Later, the story is tightened when Sujay once again tries to murder Aruna. What is being achieved by letting the entire world participate in the game of life and death through real and fictional mediums? Could Sujay crack the meaning of the urge to murder someone? Could Sujay achieve what he wanted while celebrating the success? Such questions remain unanswered in Watale Hote Kahi Mail. 

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Research and Original Marathi Write-up: Amruta Joshi 

English Translation: Snehalata Joshi

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Different cultural forms have been impacted by different forms of globalisation. Dramatic writings and performance practices are not exceptions. My current research is to understand and examine how play writing and performances practices have been impacted by the processes of globalisation since the 1990s. My interest is in investigating how the writers and artists active in the theatre scene in India find ways of taking forward their existing practices as well as exploring alternative possibilities and ways of being, thinking and doing through globalisation. My broad premise of work is staging practices in India and focus is on Marathi playwriting within the context of theatre making and presentation through the 1990s. In this, I am looking at how individuals and groups within this vast global universe are interconnected via theatre practices and the ways in which it has provided a platform for innovation and communication for theatre: playwrights, performers and audiences from different cultural backgrounds. - Ashutosh Potdar. (For More Details)