Our Current Project
Picture: Margaret Bourke-White, Time Life, 1947
Picture: Margaret Bourke-White, Time Life, 1947 More pictures like this.

An Urgent Appeal!

We need your support to ensure that this project is developed to its maximum potential in this special year of 60th Anniversary of this major event in the history of Indian sub-continent. Please read the appeal at this link.

Hot News

  • A Lifetime on Tiptoes has been nominated for Amnesty International's Freedom of Expression Award.
     
  • Voices of Partition has already created much interest when presented by our colleague Fahro Malik at the Panjabi conference in Jalandhar, India in February and at the National College of Arts, Rawalpindi, Pakistan in March with Mazhar Tirmazi.
     

Project Events List

  • Voices of Partition - Appeal Day
    23 May 2007, 7:30PM at the House of Commons, London
    Entry by invitation ONLY.

  • Previews:
    23 June 2007 at Stratford Circus (East London)
    in Panjabi at 6.30 and English at 8pm.
     
  • Performances at the Edinburgh Festival
    from 6-27 August 2007
    at The Vault.
     

 

Click here to see some of the quotes from the audience at our recent workshops in Edinburgh & Glasgow.

A LIFETIME ON TIPTOES
Healing the wounds of Partition with a challenging story for our time

1947-2007
Sixtieth Anniversary of the Partition of India and Creation of Pakistan

A seminal new play in Panjabi - by Mazhar Tirmazi

We are pleased to present A Lifetime on Tiptoes by the eminent poet Mazhar Tirmazi to mark the sixtieth year of Partition and to remember the holocaust of 1947. Audiences will have the opportunity to share their own stories of Partition to enable a healing process to take place across the Indian/Pakistani communal divide.

A mother shows us the wounds of her soul as history starts bleeding. This poignant play deals with the fading but unforgettable events of 1947. The migrations of traumatised generations are told in the form of "qissas", stories that grip the main character so that he begins to doubt his sanity. Characters meet, intermingle and part in a piece that offers hope amid despair and love beyond geographical borders.

The events of 1947 witnessed ethnic cleansing on a massive scale, creating 13 million refugees.

The Partition of India was much more than just another historical event. Partition's issues of ethnic cleansing and conflict across a religious/sectarian divide mean it is a play for our times. The world has witnessed many mini-Partitions since 1947 in places as far afield as Palestine, Kosovo, Rwanda, Ulster and Cyprus. The so-called War on Terror, the strife in Kashmir and the deadly bomb blasts in Mumbai show that the issues raised are still highly relevant in the modern world.

The inspiration behind the play...

 

Premiere: Edinburgh Festival 2007 in *Panjabi with English subtitles
Workshop readings available.

PROJECT TIMELINE

JULY 2005. Play completed taking two years to write including a four month research visit to Pakistan where Mazhar interviewed several people including his mother who was twenty in 1947. The plays roots actually lie with Mazhar visiting his ancestral village in East Panjab (India) in 1998. The development process begins.

OCTOBER 2005. Reading in Oxford. At this point, Mazhar goes to Pakistan.

FEBRUARY 2006. Reading with key writers, intellectuals and artists including Najam Hussain Syed. Again amazing feedback.

MARCH 2006. The play is performed to an audience of 1,000 in pin-drop silence at the Panj Pani (Five Rivers) Festival in Lahore that aims to use theatre to break down barriers in the Indo-Pakistan divide.

January 2007. Bilingual workshop and reading in Birmingham.

 

*Panjabi is Britain’s second most spoken language, with speakers from Pakistan, India and East Africa.


We want to celebrate a secular Panjabi identity with a challenging story for our times. Dominic Rai – Director


Recommended Reading:

Train to Pakistan by Khushwant Singh. 50th Anniversary edition 2006 with Partition photographs by Margaret Bourke-White, Time Life 1947. Rolli books available from Soma books.
 



For further information contact Mán Melá Theatre Company
Flat P4, 50 Roman Road, London E2 0LT
Tel: 07966 215090 Email dominic@manmela.org.uk