For a Fair Cause

For 21 years,theatre director and actor Sushama Deshpande has played the role of Savitri Bai Phule.

For 21 years,theatre director and actor Sushama Deshpande has played the role of Savitri Bai Phule,a Marathi poet and the first woman teacher of the first womans school in India. More than 2,500 performances later,Deshpande is today synonymous with her character. Hence,when her latest play Bayaa Daar Ughaad was performed at the ongoing Mahindra Excellence in Theatre Awards (META) festival on Friday,the citys theatre lovers packed the hall,even those who did not understand Marathi.

The play deals with the women saints who lived in Maharashtra between the 13th and 18th centuries. Hats off to all the male saints of India,to Tukaram,Eknath and all the others for their contribution. But,what about the women saints? How come we never look at them? says Deshpande,55. When she began looking,she found that their stories could almost be unfolding in the 21st century.

As one of the protagonists Vithabai confronts domestic abuse by rejecting her husband,and another,Kanhopatra,a sex worker,asserts her right to worship the God of her choice,they become models of self-assertion for modern women. One by one,the snippets on various women saints unfold,each fighting a different social norm,each emerging as victorious and free.

I have never fought patriarchy. I just ignored them, says Deshpande about herself. In rural Maharashtra,where she performs before her favourite audience,the village women,Deshpande signs off her act by saying,There is a strong woman in each one of you. It strikes me that more than Savitri Bai,it is the women saints who are closer to the village women. The saints themselves were village women,yet they strove for self expression and found it.

They were illiterate,yet they composed bold and striking abhangs, she says.

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