Abhiwyakti, a group of children from Indirapuram, performed two skits against at Shipra Mall on February 4. The group was led by Somya Pandey, a journalist turned artist. One of the skits was about racial discrimination faced by North-East Indians, while the other was a political satire that scoffed at the behaviour of Indian politicians before and after the elections.
Both skits were performed by kids in the age group of four to fourteen. The first skit brought forth the Nido Tainam incident of racial attack, in which a 19-year-old North Eastern student was beaten to death by a group of people in Lajpat Nagar market in 2014. It dealt with the struggles that people from North-East face on a daily basis. While sharing her deep rooted angst about the discrimination, the curator Saumya Pandey told City Spidey, “I am only trying to smuggle a little social change in to the minds of children, as they are the upcoming generation and the people to awake everyone else and parents also listen to them.”
“I live in Ashok Vihar, which is quite close to Delhi University, which has become a mecca for racial discrimination," said Pandey. "North Eastern women wearing shorts, skirts or sleeveless outfits are often wrongly perceived by an average North Indian man, who attaches promiscuity, sexual availability and even prostitution with their image. They are often subjected to racial slurs such as momo, Chinese, chinki among others, which are direct assaults to their physical features.
"I have been living in Delhi for almost three years now, and I am harassed more than an average Indian girl," said Namrata Singha, who hails from Manipur. "Just because my eyes are smaller and height is shorter, does not give anyone a right to judge my character. My clothes have nothing to do with my sexual inclinations.”
Shifting gaze, the second skit, was a satire encompassing the election gimmicks seen during the polls in India. “India being a democracy witnesses mass voter turnouts, but the elected representatives seldom seem to do the right thing for the public. "The bottom line of this skit is that in the end, it is the common man who suffers," said Pandey.
The play also included instances of recent incidents such as beef ban, Dadri lynching and misuse of public funds, which somehow take the centre stage and the focus is diverted from the welfare of people. An example of misuse of public money was justified by the discussion on Mayawati’s Rashtriya Dalit Prerna Sthal inaugurated in Noida.
