Themes of Puppetry with special reference to Assam

The themes of puppetry are drawn from different sources.The diversity inherent in the theme gives an intrinsic characteristic to puppet performance. Culture of different places has their own folktales, legend and myth. Puppet belong to different parts of the world enact stories from their respective sources. The story or theme is the most important segment of puppet show. Puppet is one of the popular communication media, so its story or theme plays an important role in success of the show. Variation in theme is one of the unique features of puppetry.Puppetry of different areas have their own identity.Initially,puppets were use to performed religious rites, so every traditional puppet troupe adopts stories from religious text. In India,the Ramayana is the main source of the text of puppet tradition.The Ramayana has translated into different vernacular languages and known by different name in different place.

In Assam,episodes of the Ramayana like Rambijoy, Sita Swayambar,Lanka Kanda,Ram Ravan yuddha,Sita haran,Parasu Ramar matri hatya,Andho munir abhisap, Harodhonu bhongo, etc. are very popular themes of traditional Puppetry.On the other hand, Draupadi Swayambor, Parijat Haran, Bastra haran, Jarasandha badh etc. are popular episode of the Mahabharata acted through puppetry.Stories from Bhagawat Puran like Harichandra Upakhyan,Harihora Yuddha are also performed through puppetry. Puppetry is a drama form,which has popularity among different age group of people.While choosing themes for shows, puppeteer gives preference on his targeted audience.Stories from Hitoprodesh, Panchotantra etc.are generally drows for stuents or for childrens.Folktales are very popular among childrens.In Assam,folk tales are very popular themes of puppetry for child audience.Now a days secular themes are most popular source of theme for puppetry. Generally, folk tales with morality, awareness about environment, cleanliness are theme of puppet shows.

Change and continuity:

With the passage of time,puppetry has changed a lot. As a medium of communication,different vital issues are depicted in puppetry. Puppetry reflects the contemporary time.Vital issues like dowry, female infanticide, illiteracy, status of woman etc.These issues are used as theme of puppetry to create awareness among common mass.Government publicity unit of different states releases fund for this type of campaigning.Manoranjan Roy,the famous puppeteer of Assam told in an interaction that for the sake of continuity of puppetry,he has introduced new secular themes in his puppet troupe.To compete with modern mediums of entertainment, improvisations are made by the puppeteers.

Experiments on puppetry in India is going on and introducing of new themes have given a new zest to it.India’s well known puppeteers like Puran Bhatt,Dadi Pudumjee,Anurupa Roy etc.are experimenting with themes as well as introducing digital lighting,combining human actors to puppet stage has transformed puppetry from folk to modern form of performing art.According to India’s one of the reknowned puppeteer Dadi Pudumjee, “it is important for puppetry to evolve, otherwise it goes into a museum.”^[1]

Footnotes and references:

[1]:

Interaction of Shefalee Vasudev with Dadi Pudumjee,published in Indian Express on 15 January,2012