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KARACHI: The first Karachi Theatre Festival organised by the Arts Council of Pakistan will take place from July 22 to Aug 7, announced the council’s Ahmed Shah at a press conference on Thursday.

Mr Shah said it’s a first of its kind event in which almost all renowned theatre directors of the country would display their talent. He said when the idea struck him, he immediately went to the renowned theatre person Zia Mohyeddin, who agreed to participate in the festival.

He said the festival would begin with Intizar Husain’s play Khwabon Ke Musafir, directed by Mr Mohyeddin. It would end with Siachen penned by Anwar Maqsood, he said.

Mr Shah said when he and his team set out to finalise things, they received 27 plays, which made it difficult for them to decide which ones to give the green signal to. Among the noted senior individuals whose dramas would be staged, he named Talat Husain, Sajid Hasan, Khalid Ahmed, Zain Ahmed and Anjum Ayaz whereas the young directors include the likes of Fawad Khan, Uzma Sabeen and Sunil Shankar.

He said there were more than 17 plays on the list which was why on weekends there would be more than one production.

Mr Shah said it was not a ticketed event because the aim was to focus on intellectual elite and the younger lot to come and experience the realm of the theatre. He said anyone in the city could come, show their ID cards and grab the tickets for the play.

Describing the objectives of the festival, he said theatre was not as established a genre in Pakistan as it was in other parts of the world. He said theatre was a medium of communication. He said in the past when there was no newspapers, the voices of dissent against the rulers were raised through the theatre. He said another aim was to educate people through the art form. He claimed such activities instilled softness (gudaaz) in people.

Actor Talat Husain said there was two kinds of (creative) cultures in the world. Ours, he said, was the culture of poetry and storytelling (dastangoi). He said there was no culture of theatre in our part of the world which was why Muslims came very late to it. He said theatre was started by the Greeks as a kind of awareness of the conscience. We didn’t have that, he said. Gradually things changed and people adopted the theatre.

Prof Ajaz Farooqui said in the West going to the theatre was a matter of ‘honour’.

Originally published in Dawn, July 1st, 2016