NEW DELHI:
Minister of State for Culture and Tourism Dr Mahesh Sharma released a publication and a set of DVDs providing a rich and spectacular repository of information on ‘Bhand Pather’, the celebrated folk theatre form of Kashmir.
The publication, ‘An Illustrated Monograph of Bhand Pather, the Folk Theatre of Kashmir’, is the outcome of three days of performances and symposium held at Indira Gandhi National Centre for Arts (IGNCA) in the capital. The publication celebrates the Bhand folk theatre, which is among the five theatre forms mentioned in 
Bharatamuni’s Natyashastra. A DVD containing 50 minutes of select portions of the Bhand Pather plays performed by Bhand Troupe from Kashmir was also released.
In addition, the minister, who is also a Trustee of the IGNCA, released a set of four DVDs, containing four plays of Surabhi Theatre, namely Sri Krishnaleelalu, Bhakta Prahlad, Balanagamma and Maya Bazaar. Surabhi is the oldest institution of Family Theatre flourishing in Andhra Pradesh, with unbroken performances for the last 130 years.
“It is more important today to dwell on the heritage (virasat) that we will leave behind for the next generation rather than merely boasting of what we inherited,” observed Dr Sharma, while releasing the publication and DVDs at the IGNCA yesterday.
The minister also spoke of the vast and thoughtful mandate of the IGNCA and emphasised on the need to take its work to more and more people across the country. “There is a need to increase the outreach of the Centre, which celebrated its Silver Jubilee three years ago,” he noted.
IGNCA President Ram Bahadur Rai said he was hopeful that the newly constituted Trust of the IGNCA would work for better output and greater outreach of the organisation. “Much work has been done, but much more needs to be done, especially in the area involving the scholars and public alike in sharing the research and resources of IGNCA,” he added.
Those present on the occasion included Narendra Kumar Sinha, Secretary, Ministry of Culture; and the other IGNCA Trustees — Dr. Sonal Mansingh, Dr. Chandra Prakash Dwivedi, Nitin Chandrakant Desai, Dr. K. Arvinda Rao, Vasudeo Kamath, Dr. Bharat Gupt, Dr. M. Seshan, Rathi Vinay Jha, Prof. Nirmala Sharma, Dr. Padma Subrahmanyam, Dr. Saryu Doshi, Prasoon Joshi, Daya Prakash Sinha and Birad Rajaram Yajnik.
