Charandas Chor: And Other Plays

by Habib Tanvir

A towering figure in twentieth-century theater in India, Habib Tanvir was an actor, director, and playwright, working in Hindi and Urdu. He founded the Naya Theater in 1959, through which he created remarkable works drawing on the history and traditions of the tribal folk of Chhattisgarh. This book brings together four plays, all translated into English for the first time. Agra Bazar (1954), set in the early nineteenth century amid the bustle of a colorful street market in the iconic North Indian city, is woven together by the wonderfully human voice of the poet Nazir, and examines some of important cultural and socioeconomic issues of the period, such as the declining influence of the Urdu language and the growing power of English in colonial India. Charandas Chor (1975), Tanvir’s most famous work, is the story of a typical folk hero who robs the rich much in the style of Robin Hood and evades the law until he comes up against one wall he cannot scale—his own commitment to the truth.

​In Bahadur Kalarin (1978), Tanvir reinvents an nearly forgotten Chattisgarh folk tale about a mother–son relationship in which he finds echoes of Oedipus, while in The Living Tale of Hirma (1985) he dramatizes a historical event in which a headstrong ruler of an Indian tribe clashes with a population who want to replace the tribal way of life with newfound ideals of democracy, leading to disastrous results. Enriched by introductory texts and an intensive interview with Tanvir that covers the milestones of his illustrious career, the book will be the perfect introduction to Tanvir’s work for English-language theater fans and scholars.

376 pages, Paperback

Published April 15, 2018

About the author

Habib Tanvir was one of the most popular Urdu, Hindi playwrights, a theatre director, poet and actor. He is the writer of plays such as Agra Bazar (1954) and Charandas Chor (1975). A pioneer in Urdu, Hindi theatre, he is most known for his work with Chhattisgarhi tribals, at the Naya Theatre, a theatre company he founded in 1959 in Bhopal, and went on to include indigenous performance forms such as nacha, to create not only a new theatrical language, but also milestones such as Charandas Chor, Gaon ka Naam Sasural, Mor Naam Damad and Kamdeo ka Apna Basant Ritu ka Sapna.

For him true "theatre of the people" existed in the villages, which he strived to bring to the urban "educated", employing both folk performers as actors alongside urban actors. He died on 8th of June 2009 at Bhopal after a three week long illness. Upon his death, he was the last of pioneering actor-managers in Indian theatre, which included Sisir Bhaduri, Utpal Dutt and Prithviraj Kapoor, and often he managed plays with mammoth cast, such as Charandas Chor which included an orchestra of 72 people on stage and Agra Bazaar had 52 people.

During his lifetime he won several national and international awards, including the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award in 1969, Padma Shri in 1983, Kalidas Samman 1990, Sangeet Natak Akademi Fellowship in 1996, and the Padma Bhushan in 2002; apart from that he had also been nominated to become a member of the Upper House of Indian Parliament, the Rajya Sabha (1972-1978). His play Charandas Chor (Charandas, The Thief) got him the Fringe Firsts Award at Edinburgh International Drama Festival in 1982 [9], and in 2007, it was credited for "an innovative dramaturgy equally impelled by Brecht and folk idioms, Habib Tanvir seduces across language barriers in this his all-time biggest hit about a Robin Hood-style thief" as it was included in the Hindustan Times' list of 'India’s 60 Best works since Independence'.