By Dr. Sudipto Chatterjee PART 1 | PART 2 | PART 3
However, in Nine Hills One Valley and its two partner-plays (all written and directed by Thiyam), the ‘message’ becomes the ‘medium.’ Thiyam talks about
the history of Manipur in epic dimensions, reverting to the rich folkloric storehouse of the culture that stands in stark and dark contrast to the present condition of the
downtrodden Manipuri people. Nine Hills One Valley (Ching-lon Mapam Tampak Ama) is a haunting and powerful allegory that explores the turmoil that consumes Thiyam’s native
Manipur today. Kangla Online, a Manipuri web-based news source review of the play recognized this change of attitude in Thiyam’s art. “Amidst the ‘out of mind and out of
sight’ criticisms of some people who revile most of Ratan Thiyam’s plays [as] rather Indianised thematically, his latest production Nine Hills One Valley... is, incidentally
based on the chaotic upheavals of the world and more particularly on the present Manipur, in a solid and sensible manner. This time Nine Hills One Valley would seal the
mouths of those who... openly judged Ratan Thiyam [only] by the titles of his plays.”
Ratan Thiyam had already deeply embroiled himself in the vortex of political controversy in 2001, aligning himself with the betrayed people of his tortured home by
returning the Padma Shri, the highest honor given by the Indian Government to a civilian, in protest against the army and administration’s atrocities in Manipur. He had then
said, “Life is not normal in the valley of Manipur... [But] no tangible effort or urgency is visible on the part of the [Central Government]. It is decaying by the day and
there is no helping hand coming forward. It is not disrespect for the civilian honor.. conferred on me, it is the compulsion of my bleeding heart. Although it is a very
painful decision, I am, as a protest, relinquishing this honor.”
Nine Hills One Valley, Thiyam’s latest meditation on Manipur, does not quite come as an act of sudden alignment with the unrest at home. It is simply a more direct
vocalization of his concerns, expressed (as ever) through the concurrently robust and fragile, subtle and unequivocal, melodious and discordant, complex and simple, but
consistently engaging the language of total performativity. Once again, we bear witness to Thiyam’s masterly equipoise of theatrical harmony. Nine Hills One Valley, not
unlike his earlier masterpieces, is a true measure of Thiyam’s lucent creativity, empowered by the underlying belligerence (yet never overbearing in insistence or anger) of a
political unawareness that speaks to and partakes of the sorrows of all beleaguered peoples in a world beset with grief and unrest.
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