A culture curry for Lucknowites

A two-day cultural festival, titled, Jester was recently organised by Anant Sharma at Sangeet Natak Akademi’s Valmiki Rangshala. The event included a variety of art forms like Kathak, play and discussion with the acid attack survivors.
(L) Deepak Kabir (R) Surya Mohan (BCCL/ Vishnu Jaiswal)
The evening on day one of the fest kick-started with a Kathak performance by Swati Mishra, Sapna, Seema, Naithali and other artists on Rama Stuti.
Later, a discussion session, moderated by Deepak Kabir, was organised in which acid attack survivors Kunti and Rupali narrated the journey and struggles of their lives to the audience present there.
(L) Kunti Soni and Rupali Vishwakarma (R) Ramesh Chandra Gupta (BCCL/ Vishnu Jaiswal) (L) Anant Sharma (C) Anuj Mishra (R) Chitra Mohan (BCCL/ Vishnu Jaiswal)
A solo play titled Popcorn was also staged under the direction of Swaram Upadhyay in which Dheeraj Kumar played the role of popcorn vendor who explored several social issues in our society.
— Farhan Ahmad Siddiqui