It was for the first time that I attended the final round of the much talked about IPTA Mumbai's Hindi/Hindustani/ Urdu, One-Act intercollegiate drama competition on 22nd September 2007. This competition, which is being held for over the last three decades has come to achieve a historic significance. One can see almost three generations, side by side attending the event. Presiding over the competition were veteran IPTA people like M.S. Sathyu, Shama Sathyu, Sulbha Arya, Atul Tiwari and others. In the throng were the many young, vivacious people bursting with enthusiasm. For many years now my intermittent association with the Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan's multilingual, intercollegiate one-act drama competition has given me some idea about the calibre of such events in the city. Till last year I nearly believed that the standard of the IPTA Mumbai Competition was quite high as compared to other similar events.

I was therefore shocked to see some of the plays that were presented at this year's competition. In all I was able to catch four plays out of the participating six. Vinod Hadap's TOOT GAYE SAARE BHRAM, which was presented by R.A. Podar College, looked like a mediveal period tale, with no head or tail. The play opened in semidarkness under predominantly red and blue lights. Nothing comes out of this tale which pits spirituality against the pleasures of the flesh. It ends also on a rather inconclusive, paradoxical and inconsistent note. The actors lacked clarity in speech and words like 'Aryaputra' came across as 'Aryaputar'! The background music was too loud and the lead actress despite showing some promise as a dancer was too prosaic. All in all the production was quite amateurish.

I hoped to get something better out of the next play COCK-EYED, which was presented by St. Gonsalo Gracia College. But it was equally disappointing. The writer Sanjay Parab goes over the top in Bollywood fashion and creates a mawkish drama about a boy who suffers from a squint. The theme as well as the plot lacked all credibility. Everything was so poor and insipid that I couldn't help wondering that if these were the selected final plays, what would have been the standard of the 22 plays that were eliminated?

The third play was by Mithibai College and was titled CHAND BIKHRI KHADIYAN. Rural education, which was the theme of the play was simplified as well as trivialized. The only saving grace in the play was that of the young actor (Amatya Garodia) who played the student's character. He didn't have any inhibitions and had a strong, clear voice. Even the actor playing the education inspector was acceptable in his role.

The last play that I was able to see was Ramnarain Ruia College's EK AUR MAYYAT. The theme of the play, which targeted ingrained differences of caste had potential. The script was packed with many issues such as the scenario of drama competitions, politics at the college level, the high handed attitude of people in power-like positions such as the director of a play, fickle minded youngsters, social prejudices of the common people, etc. All these were packed in a 40 minute play! The core issue of the prevalance of a caste-ridden society was however treated in a more melodramatic than a coherent manner.

I fail to understand the ambitions of students to encompass every thing superficially. Herein is the need for professionals to guide these young people and make them aware of the complexity of the social problems, without resorting to simplistic solutions. Competitions such as these also need to appreciate the importance of discipline. Some of the judges didn't arrive in time and as a result the competition started late. Later it was further delayed. For one particular play there was a gap of almost 45 minutes. It is high time that we get these basic things right.

*The writer is a senior theatre and television person who has trained under Ebrahim Alkazi at the National School of Drama (NSD). She has written for publications such as 'The Asian Age' and is a regular contributor to the Prithvi Theatre Newsletter (PT Notes). She also offers theatre training to students at the Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan and is an important critical voice for the Gujarati Theatre.