Ajoka Theatre is one such creative institute of Pakistan that has always kept itself updated with the latest trends, be they related to performing arts activities and the themes they revolve around, or the media though which they are presented.
In order to cater to its students residing abroad, Ajoka Theatre, on October 31, organized a session of online dramatic readings, a way of imparting art that is the need of the times we are living in, as many people prefer not to travel now in fear of encountering health issues.
In this online event held on Saturday, Ajoka students presented their scripts developed during their Art of Writing course. This was the eleventh session of new writings developed under the mentorship of playwright Shahid Nadeem. The writers included students from UK, Australia, Qatar and Pakistan and were joined by Ajoka’s acting-class students for their respective presentations on Zoom.
The event incorporated four scripts. The first script was the work of Omar Abad hailing from Qatar. Titled Johor Kay Paon, its story revolved around the deceptive human smugglers who exploit Pakistani youth’s desire to go abroad. This was followed by Islamabad’s Nida Qasim Khan’s Exposed, which deputed an imaginary world where gender roles are reversed and men are the subordinate gender. The third script was penned by Atta ur Rehman from Melbourne who addressed the story of a former actress now settled in Australia, trying to cope with her traumatic memories in his Salma Sitara. The last script was by UK based Dr Kamran Abdullah. His script titled Nusrat was the story of a middle-aged gynaecologist who has been accused of sexual harassment by her male assistant. All of these writers were assisted by Madeeha Syed, Usama Shah, Sabahat Moazzam and Fahad Amir in the readings, while Qurrat Taj acted as the coordinator of the session.
At the end of the event, course mentor Shahid Nadeem appreciated the writers for their competent narratives and innovative ideas. Ajoka Institute Director Nirvaan Nadeem also admired the efforts of the team and said that he hoped that the students would remain involved in creative writing in the days to come as well.
The writers and actors expressed their gratitude to Ajoka for providing them with a platform where they could exhibit their talents, and for guiding them in the process.
The entire event was live-streamed on Facebook.
Photos provided by Qasim Ali from Ajoka
