Lahore Arts Council's theatre festival cancelled because of Covid surge

The ongoing 10-day theatre festival organised by the Lahore Arts Council (LAC) from Jan 20 to 29 has been cancelled because of an alarming surge in Covid-19 cases in the country.

Only one play was staged on the inaugural day of the festival on Jan 20, that was Parmershar Singh, staged by the Mass Foundation. The rest of the nine performances were cancelled.

A statement issued by the LAC says that owing to an intense wave of the coronavirus, the council has canceled the festival.

The cancellation of the festival dampened the zeal of different theatre groups participating in the festival who had been rehearsing for the last two weeks their respective plays.

The groups, however, hope that with decline in the Covid intensity, the festival will be rescheduled.

WCLA: The Walled City of Lahore Authority (WCLA) is using 3D laser scanner for the collection of architectural and pictorial data of the monuments and buildings which are to be conserved, officials told Dawn.

The officials say the WCLA is the first Punjab government entity which owns the 3D laser scanner and using it for the precise architectural documentation of the buildings and monuments marked for conservation and restoration. The images drawn out by this scanner are then converted into computer-aided design (CAD) format to generate architectural drawings of the building.

WCLA Senior Architect Azeem Dad says: “The 3D laser scanning is a way to capture a physical object’s exact size and shape into the computer.”

Originally published in Dawn, January 22nd, 2022