Famous Playwrights Of India

Badal Sircar:

Badal Sircar is one of the popular playwrights in the realm of contemporary theatre. He represents the New Theatrical Movement in India. He has also created an appropriate ‘people’s theatre’, a theatre supported and created by people. He began his career with the humorous play 'Solution X'. Some of his famous plays include Evan Inderjit, That Other History and There Is No End. All these plays focus on the political, social, psychological and existential problems.

Chandrashekhara Kambara:

He is a prominent writer in Kannada language and is known for his effective usage of North Karnataka dialect in his plays and poems. His plays mainly revolve around folk or mythology which are inter-linked with contemporary issues. He wrote 22 plays, some of the popular plays include: Aramane, Mahamayi, Singaravva, Harakeya Kuri and Kulothe Chingaramma, as well as Jokumaraswamy and Sirisampige which have been translated into many other languages.

Girish Karnad:

Girish Karnad was a popular writer, director and actor who contributed to enrich the tradition of Indian English theatre. Karnad's dramatic sensibility got moulded under the influence of touring natak companies. He borrowed most of his plots from history, mythology and old legends but by using intricate symbolism he tried to establish their relevance in contemporary socio-political conditions.

Harindranath Chattopadhyay:

He has made significant contribution to the growth of Indian English drama. He wrote seven verse plays which were published under the title of Poems and Plays and all those plays are based on the lives of Indian saints. Some of his famous plays are 'Window and The Parrot'; 'The Sentry’s Lantern'; 'Sidhartha: Man of Peace'.

Rabindranath Tagore:

Rabindranath Tagore wrote most of the plays in Bengali but almost all his Bengali plays are translated in English. Some of his famous plays are: Chitra, The Post Office, Sacrifice, Red Oleanders, Chandalika, Muktadhara, Natir Puja, and all these plays are firmly rooted in the Indian ethos and ethics.

Nissim Ezekiel:

Nissim Ezekiel is known for his exceptional poetic creed and rare dramatic sensibility. Nissim Ezekiel’s Three Plays including Nalini: A Comedy, Marriage Poem: A Tragi Comedy and The Sleepwalkers: An Indo-American farces are famous. His plays contain irony and they unveil the oddities of human life and behaviour.

Sri Aurobindo:

Sri Aurobindo is also a prominent dramatist in Indian English drama. He wrote five complete blank verse plays: Perseus the Deliverer, Vasavadutta, Radoguna, The Viziers of Bassora and Eric and six incomplete plays:The Witch of Ilni, Achat and Esarhaddon, The Maid and the Mill, The House of Brut, The Birth of Sin and Prince of Edur. The plays depict different cultures and countries with a variety of characters, moods and sentiments.

Vijay Tendulkar:

Through Vijay Tendulkar’s Marathi play Indian theatre gained immensely. He indicated the new awareness and attempts of Indian dramatists of the century to depict the agonies and suffocations of man by focusing on the middle class society.

In all his plays, he deals with the theme of isolation of the individual and his confrontation with the hostile surroundings. Some of his famous plays are Chimanicha Ghor Hote Menache, Kalojanchi Shalai, Kamala, Kanyadaan and Ek Holti Mugli and all these plays reflect Tendulkar’s concern with the idea of authority and exploitation of the individual.