The mobile theatre that rocks Assam

Jatin Bora lives in rooms with gaping doorways, uses bathrooms with no basins and sleeps in beds without mattresses. But he earns a staggering Rs 39 lakh a season — 10 months — for his pains. Bora, 40, is the Shah Rukh Khan of the ‘mobile’ Kahinoor Theatre, which performs to packed houses in the remotest outposts of Assam.Kahinoor Theatre is masala unlimited— dances, romantic romps, good-natured teasing, a dash of violence and,occasionally, a triple role for its lead man. The hero fights with friends,saves the heroine from villains, and defends his homeland in war. In theinteriors of Assam, these plays stand in for films, the troupe performing atover 70 locations between August and April. They have even performed their ownversion of Ben Hur, Jurassic Park and Titanic, which ran for a record fouryears.Itinerant it may be, but the 34-year-old outfit does nottravel light: lights, tents, sets, cookingware and 2,100 chairs are carted fromvillage to village. Last month, they performed for the first time outside Assam,in Delhi. The posters are unabashedly filmi, with the opening credits as long asany film’s. A mix of stock footage — horses, rapids, hills —forms the background. “Kahinoor Theatre” slips out from behind arotating earth to take position in front — remember Universal?“We’re experts at chamak,” laughs the troupe’s70-year-old producer, Ratan Lahkar. Special effects, such as they are, arealmost entirely manual. Viewers can see both the hand moving the light and thetrolleys used for backdrop changes.Touring uninterrupted for monthsis a challenge . The hero may get respect and love from his fans but he stillhas to carry his bedding along. Where possible, Bora is allowed a luxuryaccommodation in a PWD guesthouse that may be as far as 15 km from theperformance venue. His entourage consists of a driver for his Innova and a‘caretaker’. Still, he could have done worse. At least hedidn’t have to build his own toilet by placing bamboo poles over a pit.Lahkar, who shared that experience at Rampur with actor Mahananda Sarma in the70s, relates with relish and helpless giggles the unfortunate incidents relatedto the makeshift contraption.Poorly maintained cinema halls andfrequent bomb blasts have affected the film industry, he says, but Kahinoor hasflourished. One reason for this could be that Lahkar is daring in his choice ofscripts, even introducing the classics to a rural audience. With amaster’s in political science, he’s one of the first educatedartistes to join mobile theatre and widen its horizons. Over the last threedecades, Kahinoor has produced plays based on The Mayor of Casterbridge, DrJekyll and Mr Hyde and the Greek and Indian epics. Sophocles, Shakespeare,Sudraka are all part of their repertoire.The mobile theatre remainsa largely male world. Of the 120 members in Kahinoor, less than a dozen arewomen. “People know what kind of lifestyle it is,” says AichengfaBoruah, Kahinoor’s 28-year-old heroine. “( But) My parents believein me.” This is her first stint with a mobile theatre. Girls, she says,stay with small families and are well taken care of. “They cook what welike, give us gamuchas (cotton scarf) and stay in touch,” says Boruah.“The boys in the team are like bhaiyyas.” She, like Bora, has herown car, driver and a caretaker who cooks for her. Her college-professor motherencourages her fiancé, a Guwahati-based businessman, to chaperon her.“He’s seen me perform so many times, he must know the scripts byheart,” she laughs.The only problem is there isn’t abreak. “Even if we die, we can’t stop,” she says dramatically.She once performed with a festering boil that she’d taken antibioticinjections for. “In three plays, I had five dances. I got picked up andflung about. It was painful.” Bora’s father was in the ICU with abrain tumour on the first day he performed for Kahinoor, back in 2007. The playwas Abuj Dara Achin Kaina (Insensitive Bridegroom, Unknown Bride) where he had atriple role — possibly a first in theatre — of a film actor, apoliceman and a dwarf. He recalls, “I was under a lot of stress. But kisibhi condition mein (in any condition), the show must go on.”