The time is right. The stage is set. Yuvraj Bajaj, the protagonist of 1857–India’s War of Independence, a play to be staged on August 14, is ready with his lines. But not once does he refer to the script in his hands. It’s etched in his heart. A plot so riveting comes by rarely and he’s doing his best to narrate this thrilling account of the times surrounding the first war of Independence, told through the only Indian eye-witness—the papers of young priest Vishnu Bhatt Versaikar.
Bajaj jokingly pinches himself twice in the one-hour conversation we have with him. “I cannot believe I got this part. It’s challenging and here I am doing it,” says the artiste, adding, “Vishnu was the only Indian eyewitness to the horrors of the Mutiny of 1857, which the East India Company perpetrated and which led to India’s conquest by Britain under Queen Victoria in 1858. Vishnu documented his adventures, through the 11-month rule of Rani Lakshmibai of Jhansi, the unbearably cruel sack of the city by the British, and her final death just outside Gwalior in Murar where she was cremated by Tatya Tope in a beautiful and moving ceremony on the battlefield. The Rani was never captured by the British,” he says.
The audience will get to witness events that took place during the year that changed our country’s fortunes for the next century and a half, making us a part of the British Empire. Bajaj finds it fascinating how despite being born in the 21th century, he can so closely experience history through being part of the play. “This is an important work that dramatically makes the point that we have to re-evaluate our history, without losing ourselves in petty party politics, to really develop a sense of identity and belonging, which encompasses our various diversities,” he says.
August 14, at Akshara Theatre, 11B, Baba Kharak Singh Marg, 6 pm onwards. Tickets worth Rs 250 are available on bookmyshow.com and the theatre.