Sometimes all it takes is love to tell the same story with the same dialogues,sets,actors and clothes for more than 20 years. This is one of the reasons that the play Tumhari Amrita,a part of the collective memory of a generation,has become a part of the new generations memory too. Shabana Azmi plays the bohemian artist Amrita Nigam and Farooq Shaikh,her lover Zulfiqar Haider at the Tagore stage on Tuesday. The action comprises the two actors reading out letters through the evening,narrating a saga of two youngsters who meet at a party and become friends,and how their lives travel in opposite directions yet meet at several crossroads. The play travels to Chandigarh courtesy the SJOBA Foundation,an endeavour of the alumni of St Johns High School,Chandigarh. The Old Boys,as they are popularly known as,have created a new foundation to promote sports,education and creative activities among the alumni and current students of the school. The idea,explains Vivek Vahi,Chairman of the foundation,is to scout for talent within the SJOBA fraternity and organise activities that encourage students to pursue their dreams. To achieve this goal,the membership fee is deposited in a corpus and the interest earned is used to spot and train talent. Math-O-Matics,for instance,is an interesting training module to help children develop an affinity for the subject and prepare for the International Math Olympiad. Crucible is the Foundations club which writer Vivek Atray,also the foundations Secretary,takes keen interest in. It focuses on creative writing and budding writers have regular interactions with authors and poets,the most recent being Ruskin Bond. A non-profit body with 17 members,the foundation comprises members spread all over India and abroad. They felt that it was time they involved more people in their endeavour and also added an artistic chapter to their list of activities. The first step in this direction is hosting the classic Tumhari Amrita. Tumhari Amrita will be staged at Tagore Theatre on July 17 at 7 pm
