What is Aao Manto by NAPA?

New web series based on Manto’s 1940 radio plays premieres on October 14

The National Academy of Performing Arts has initiated this project by the name of Aao Manto, a series of ten comedy plays originally written by Saadat Hassan Manto for All India Radio in 1940.

NAPA is adapting the plays for the web, each one of them starting with the word “Aao (come)” and attaching an activity along, such as Aao Behs Karein (Come Let’s Argue) and Aao Taash Khelein (Come Let’s Play Cards). The series with its first play premiered on the 14th of October and will continue for almost two weeks until all the ten plays come to an end. Aao Manto series (for the web) has been directed by Aqeel Ahmed and involves NAPA’s 2021 batch of theatre graduates.

For those who haven’t had the chance to read the plays as originally conceived and written by Manto, the Aao series of these dramatic works by Manto is based on conversations that take place within the four walls of houses, thus being domestic yet talking at length regarding the nuances of household issues and other social problems that in one way or the other get connected with domesticity.

Aao Manto can be accessed at NAPA’s YouTube channel, where each performance is uploaded with a gap of one day.