Celebrate World Theatre Day with Bangalore Hindi Theatre Community

Amit Aggarwal, founder of Bangalore Hindi Theatre Community, invites theatre groups to World Theatre Day celebrations

Theatre, is a space where drama comes alive, stories unfold with actors performing right in front of you. Theatre, despite having a record of not being a platform to sustain actors financially, has stood the test of time across borders, ages, culture, languages and stories. To celebrate this creative space, theatre enthusiast Amit Aggarwal, is organising an evening for Hindi theatre practitioners on World Theatre Day.

 “Theatre practitioners from across the city will meet, ideate and share their dreams for 2025,” says Amit, the founder of the Bangalore Hindi Theatre Community. The 45-year old theatre enthusiast from Sarjapur plunged into theatre in 2005 in Bengaluru. “I have primarily been active in Hindi theatre. When I ventured into this space there were hardly two or three groups that were into Hindi theatre and about 10 to 15 practitioners. At that point of time, I felt a need to expand the horizon for Hindi theatre, have more people join theatre and be aware of what is happening in this space.”

The Bangalore Hindi Theatre Community was founded in 2012 with three theatre groups, says Amit. “Over the years we have 50 active groups and over 1,000 theatre practitioners in the community.” The community grew, Amit says and so did its objectives.

“Now it is no longer about networking between artists and groups but a space to help people who come to the city or those who dream of starting a theatre group or actors who need to find a group to act in.”

Besides this, the community also helps with stage props and costumes. “With lack of large, storage spaces, we help groups share props and costumes. This not only helps in cutting costs and time for productions, but also opens doors for collaborative interactions.” Amit runs the community on his own, and provides these connections free of cost. He welcomes help on a voluntary basis.

Being a theatre practitioner himself for the past two decades, Amit says he decided to start a community and not a theatre group. “A lot of theatre happens in Bengaluru, but in pockets spread across the city. It was important to do cross-collaborative work, by creating a theatre community, where an actor is not restricted to just one group but can work across groups.”

The choice of celebrating World Theatre Day (March 27) on March 29 was a deliberate one, says Amit. “In Bengaluru with the traffic and distance, we realised that the footfalls are low when events happen on weekdays.”