AGNI JOL
Director : Manoj Kumar Saha (Abir)
Writer : Girish Karnad
Adoptation : Bibhash Chakrobarty
Group : Nayabad Titas, WEST BENGAL
Language : Bengali
Duration : 130 mint
Date : 12 Feb 2025
Play : AGNI JOL
An adaptation of Girish Karnad’s Agni Mattu Male, Agni Jol is a story drawn from myth and spun out of threads that create a resonating experience, chronicling a blood feud waged over knowledge and power, and the consequences that follow. Bent on avenging the lack of honor and recognition accorded to his father, Bharadwaj – honor and recognition which Bharadwaj’s brother, the sage Raibhya, received instead – Bharadwaj’s son, Javakri, after having attained knowledge and abilities of a cosmic scope, manipulates the destruction of Raibhya and of his family for the suffering the latter had imposed on the former: his sons, Arvasu, who has taken to the socially undervalued vocation of an actor, and Paravasu, who presides over the central event which is the yajna performed to invoke the god of rains, and Paravasu’s spouse, Visakha, who shares her own past with Javakri, a past which he exploits for his purposes. What unfolds is a plot filled with treachery and violence, leading to dire consequences befalling all the players concerned, including Arvasu’s companions in the theatre troupe, especially the manager and Nittilai, the individual of Arvasu’s love. Violence begets violence, as the pursuit of power and control leads to the dissolution of invaluable familial bonds both chosen and inherited and harm and oppression caused to the persecuted and the dispossessed, revealing the mechanism behind cyclical patterns of greed and apathy, and posing the puzzle of whether and how it is possible to break these cycles – whether and how it is possible to summon the rain in the face of engulfing flames.
