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Vijaya Mehta gave my words a stage, my creativity a home

I learned a lot from Vijaya, about the meaning of space and time in theatre, about writing a text for performance. This was not the guru-shishya tradition because there is no such thing in theatre. You learn on your own or perish. But I like to call myself Vijaya Mehta’s protege

Vijaya passed away on June 30 in Mumbai at the age of 91.

Written by: MAHESH ELKUNCHWAR

5 min readJul 2, 2026 05:11 PM IST First published on: Jul 2, 2026 at 05:11 PM IST

It has been a long association which started in 1970 between a young greenhorn writer and a theatre director and actor of national repute. I started writing in 1967, and my publisher Shri Pu Bhagwat took the risk of publishing my one-act plays in his prestigious Satyakatha. He sent it to Vijaya Mehta, who was training at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts (RADA) at the time. “Here is a new voice, see if you like it,” he told her, and Vijayabai did. She wrote to me from London: “I have been looking for something like this since I came here. I am coming back in four months, and I want to do your plays.” Sultan, Holi, Yatanaghar, one after another, she produced and directed my one-act plays under the banner of Rangayan.

Before this, I had never sent any of my plays to a director. How many directors would do a one-act play? But Vijaya had returned with many innovative ideas; she had a new bunch of young actors. The atmosphere was just right for experimentation.

A lot of new things had been done even before this, but we needed to do something bursting not only with new ideas but stylistically different. This was the time when the Marathi literary scene was undergoing a sea change. There was new life in Marathi poetry, short stories and novels, and this vitality spilled over to theatre. B S Mardhekar had revolutionised literary sensibility. Vijay Tendulkar had already started writing, and Vijaya had done one or two of his plays as well.

Rangayan was founded around 1959-60. When I joined hands with Bai, as Vijaya was called, I knew that I had found my home ground. We were not interested in entertaining; fame and money were not even on our radar. We wanted to explore theatre, art and life through our work. And, we did not have a target audience.

The premise we started with was that we were learning something from theatre. So, I would write a play, and she would pick it up, and we would work together on it. After five or six shows, maximum 10, we said, “Enough of that, we have learned what we can from this one. Now, let’s move on.” It was never our ambition to do a hundred shows and reach out to people. Rangayan had about 400 or 500 members — writers, artists, painters and musicians. We got feedback from them, and that helped us grow.

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I learned a lot from Vijaya, about the meaning of space and time in theatre, about writing a text for performance. This was not the guru-shishya tradition because there is no such thing in theatre. You learn on your own or perish. But I like to call myself Vijaya Mehta’s protege. She would say, “You were never my protege; I have been your friend.” “That’s fine, but I’d like to call myself your protege,” I would retort. It was a beautiful creative togetherness.

Vijaya did about five plays of mine in the beginning. That kind of experimental theatre was appreciated only by a handful of people and did not travel outside Mumbai and Pune, but the elite of the Marathi literary and theatre world got to know about my work because of Vijaya.

Though Vijaya’s experimental theatre phase lasted 15 to 20 years, she did not ever completely dissociate from it. Later, when she decided to work in professional Marathi theatre, she brought a fresh approach to the genre as well. A pioneer in many senses, her contribution to Marathi theatre is irreplaceable.

A teacher, guide, philosopher, friend, confidante — she was many things to me. Very few people have lived such a rich creative life as Bai. She was admired by people all over the world, particularly in Germany, where she did Shakuntalam and Mricchakatikam in German with German actors. She brought Bertolt Brecht’s The Caucasian Chalk Circle, adapted as Ajab Nyaya Vartulacha to Marathi theatre.

Saying that her death is a big loss will be underrating her contribution, her service to India. I am going to miss her dearly. She was 91 and ill. I met her about six months ago, and I could see that the end was coming. It was not exactly a shock when the news came, but a loss is a loss, and when it comes, you realise that you are really never prepared for it.

The writer is a playwright