Sakaar's Gujarati play "Veenaben Viral thaya" staged at Ghatkopar (Mumbai) on 26.5.2019

The biggest menace to the mankind of today

It is not mobile that is being used by you rather it is the mobile that is using you.

हिन्दी में इस नाटक की समीक्षा पढ़ने के लिए - यहाँ क्लिक कीजिए

Everyone in nowadays is a slave of mobile phones. It's a fad of new youths. The children also treat it as a part and parcel of their daily life for video games. The housewives like it as a tool of having endless gossips with their relatives and friends. The men use to do all business work only over mobile phone only. But how much disastrous it can be has been well illustrated in this play. The tragedy comes up ल्कin garb of a full-blown comedy in the first half. Though after interval it's a singular tale of fight for justice of a bruised mother.

A child in the house is always lost with mobile phone.  He plays video games with his partner at some remote place over some point of the globe. Either it is morning, evening or late night he is always engaged with his mobile phone. The parents first ignore it out of their fondling gesture but when they learn that the apple of their eyes has failed in every subject in the annual exam, their panic button gets pressed. 

Suddenly  the parents stop allowing the boy to use the mobile phone. The boy loses his self-composure for want of  phone as of late  he has become an addict of it. He threatens to cut the veins of his wrist and commit suicide if phone is not given to him. His father somehow is able to handle the situation successfully and the child is taken to task for it.  After some time the child stands up on the wall of the balcony and threatens to jump down from the fourth storey if the mobile is  not given to him. Does the boy really falls down? This is to be seen in the show.

The real story starts after it. When the mother is so moved as to determine to get all the children of the country getting rid of this lethal addiction of mobile. She pledges to force the government to write salutatory warning over the  mobile phones that it is injurious for the user to use. Her grit, her painstaking efforts and her nerves to tackle the obstacles in her mission is the real story. The biggest challenge she faces is that her adversary is her own going-to-be son-in-law. Isn't it interesting? No doubt it's the justice that wins at the end of the day but what happens with the going-to-be son-in-law of Veenaben is to be seen in the show.

As the show is taking rounds more revelation on the story side will not be justified. Let us move to the assessment of the show.

The story by Deep Patel is out of the box and certainly not on the hackneyed track. He has the guts to take the most relevant and yet not talked about issue ahead with all of its ramification. This is certainly not a formula story but there are enough moves and turns that keep you hooked during the whole go of it. 

The director Parth Desai has succeeded in threading each bites of the scenes as a seamless flow. 

The actors were Disha Savla Upadhyay, Bharat Thakker, Parag Shah, Ajeenkya Sampat, Hardik Chouhan, Simran Arora, and Child Artist Ved Shah/Darsh Patel. The child artist has given outstanding performance by any yardstick. His facial expression, body language and accent of dialogue delivery were worth getting this vital role. Vinaben has done full justice to her role which is admittedly the main character. She is only matriculate but is a lioness when does come the matter of justice. She with her forceful and nonchalant dialogue delivery won the hearts of the people. 

The grandfather and father of the boy have acted superbly but the incredible performance was from the the advocate of Vinaben. He not only entertained the viewers with his mimicry of Amitabh Bachchan but was also able to show the genuine concern about the duty of a responsible lawyer. The daughter and would-be son-in-law acted well still the son-in-law can give more impressive performance in the next shows. After all,  he is opposite to Vinaben in the court and his effect of dialogue delivery must match with her. The other lawyers and Judge did justice with their respective roles.

The external music inputs was prompt and added the required effect. Lights and sound system were flawless but the set design was really well thought-off. This is because the the same property was used for making internal and external side of the wall of the High Court and so brilliantly. To show the child really falling from the balcony must have been a challenge that was successfully met.

Producer Sakaar, Pranav Tripathi and Kaustubh Triivedi who presented the showw must be appreciated wholeheartedly and especially the writer as they have considered much  beyond their petty commercial interest and tried to address the biggest menace of the mankind in modern era that is still to be comprehended by the people at large.

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Review by - Hemant Das 'Him'

Photograph - Sakaar

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