For reasons beyond my understanding, there is a severe lack of good theatre in Delhi. In case you didn’t know - Delhi is home to the National School of Drama (NSD), the premier institute for dramatics in the country.
Bombay and Calcutta (or whatever they are calling them these days) have a strong theatre scene despite the competition from equally great regional cinema. Good Hindi movies are rare (unless you go back to the 70’s) and good Hindi theatre even more so. There is also a dearth of original playwriting in Hindi (and maybe the audience or lack of, is to blame) and most of the plays that I have seen have been translations from other regional languages or, more commonly, from English.
As a teenager I regularly got to watch plays, both in Hindi and English, produced by the dramatics society of the students of IITD. Some of them were directed by the noted theatre personality Faizal Alkazi; everything from the music to the set design and performances, was very professional. That is where my love for theatre began.
