One started believing that Totakahini, Rabindranath Tagore’s critique of the colonial education system, has exhausted itself in theatre. Only a few — like the ones produced by the Department of Drama and Dramatics, Jahangirnagar University (directed by Yusuf Hassan Arka) and Uttarpara Bratyajon (directed by Krishnendu Dewanji) — remained with us; the former for gently nudging the audience into an impromptu debate, and the latter for loading it with symbolic connotations. Amid this lull comes Balarko Nimta — a very young group from North 24 Parganas — with Totar Kahani.

Totar Kahani, the name itself, suggests a pan-Indian picture. Basanta Pathradkar, who scripts and directs this production besides donning the sutradhar’s garb, locates the Tagore poem in the middle but adopts it in keeping with the digital revolution gaining momentum in India. It keeps referring, albeit obliquely, to a totalitarian state ruled by a reckless king (played effectively by Nilanjan Halder), where the academics play to the dominant ideology, where education turns into an information-spewing industry, where development models turn unsustainable, and civil society keeps mum. Inserting elements of absurdity ranging from a Sukumar Ray poem to the mimicry of court norms in Satyajit Ray’s Hirak Rajar Deshe, and ruffling a few feathers by referring to the surge in student suicides in India, the engagement of Phondi Mantri aka poll strategists to propel political ambitions, Totar Kahani offers a no-holds-barred critique of the contemporary Indian polity. Supported by a background score that stitches familiar tunes evoking a series of images, the veteran mime-artist, Bidyut Dutta, designs a stunning scenography with parrots and humans caught in a timeless world. Balarko actors, especially a supremely athletic Puja Kundu playing the parrot, are trained to craft a meticulous act. However, the ending belied the critical one.

Totar Kahani was last staged at the 13th All India Short Drama Competition (March 2-8) organized by New Delhi Kalibari at LTG Auditorium. That it won several top honours including Best Production, Female Actor, Script and Music is only the tip of the iceberg, for Totar Kahani has achieved a seamless blending of realistic acting with pantomime. Such transfusions between sister arts hold key to the future of theatre in urban India.