This year India observes the 150th birth anniversary of Margaret Elizabeth Noble, who is our very own Sister Nivedita, known for laying down her life for the service of mankind. To mark the occasion Viveka Bani Study Circle and Meghdoot ballet troupe presented a multimedia musical enactment named Sister Forever on the great soul’s life at The Calcutta University Institute Hall.
Pravrajika Devaprana Mataji, secretary of Ramkrishna Sarada Mission, Sister Nibedita Girls High School, lit the auspicious lamp to mark the beginning. Sister Foreverwas a dance drama conceptualised and choreographed by Suvasish Dutta, a disciple of Bharatanatyam dancer Anita Mallick. Sukalyan Bhattacharya, who is well versed in every field connected with the performing arts, provided visual directions to the drama.
Being a dancer himself, Dutta chose to enact the life of Sister Nivedita through the vocabulary of dance — a universal language, which crosses all geographical, thematic and literary barriers. Dutta nurtured more than one aim in choosing to focus on Sister Nivedita’s life. Women have always been treated as second class citizens in the scheme of things and a majority of them live in penury, with no education or means of livelihood.
To face such issues and bring in awareness, no subject could be better than to focus on than the life of Sister Nivedita. The drama started with the Rabindrasangeet, Jagote Anando jaggye aamar nimontron with the picture of Nivedita shown through an audiovisual. The monks performed to the song, Khandan bhava bandhana written by Swami Vivekananda in honour of his Guru, Sri Ramakrishna. It preaches freedom from the bonds of the world.
The life of Sister Nibedita was etched intelligently from the time Swami Vivekananda invited her to come to India. Her sailing to India on 28 January 1898 was shown audio-visually. The folk-song, Amaye Dubailire amaye bhasailre composed by poet Jasimuddin symbolically expressed how Sister was immersed in a river without banks to her life’s mission at the behest of her Guru Swami Vivekananda. In 1819, she witnessed the abject poverty of Calcutta and responded to Swamiji’s call for change. He invited her to Star Theatre.
The declaration by Swamiji at Star Theatre that Sister Nivedita is a gift from England proved prophetic. Here the shloka,Puurnam adah,Purnam Idan Puurnat Udacyte, meaning divine consciousness is infinite, was aesthetically used.
The drama moved with the beauty of the dances rendered with the utmost care. At this point the song, Prano bhariye trisha hariye expressed Sister Nivedita’s feelings from the core of her heart — her wish for a place in the country. On the other hand, Ma Achhe aar aami achi was appropriately chosen to show that when everyone was against the idea of opening a school for girls, it was Ma Sarada who supported her whole-heartedly.
The historical date 13 November 1898, when the girls’ school was inaugurated by Sarada Devi in the presence of Swami Vivekananda was highlighted. Sister’s work with the plague affected poor people brought home the messiah in her. Calcutta was truly lucky to get a dedicated soul like Nivedita.
She embraced nationalism as a true Indian and opposed Lord Curzon’s policy of the partition of Bengal in 1905. Here the song Bande Mataram told it all as did Jadi tor daak sune keu na ashe tabe ekla chalore.
The patriotic song Banglar mati banglar jal showed many sides to the persona of Sister Nivedita. Not only was she an avid educationist, a champion of the freedom of the country and a spiritually advanced soul, her heart always beat for the down trodden and the needy.
She was a true disciple of Swami Vivekananda. The message of the production was that her work should be carried forward. Where does one have a person like Sister Nivedita with an untainted soul? Bharatanatyam dancer Anita Mallick was excellent in her abhinaya depicting the emotions of the saint. Jharna Neogy was a look alike for Ma Sarada dressed in a red-bordered saree with her long hair in front.
Dancers Saheli Mahapatra, Madhurima Chaudhuri, Tania Saha, Pradipto Chatterjee, Sarnava Sen and Tamal Pal danced their way into the hearts of the audience — their style was contemporary. The script was by Rudrorup Mukhopadhayay.
Harsh Neotia and Ahona Pal were quite impressive as narrators. Singers Goutam Das Baul, Dipannita Acharya, Saikat Biswas, Sourendra and Soumyajit did justice to the vocal renditions. Ganesh Ghosh and Dipa Ghosh were the producers. Urjoswi Ghosh took the role of the child Elizabeth Margaret. The choreographic work of Dutta looked into the minute details of each and every aspect and that made it truly perfect.