Seeing the story of the stupid, mindless king, there was a lot of applause, the audience appreciated the acting of the actors. Seeing the story of the stupid, mindless king, there was a lot of applause, the audience appreciated the performance of the actors.

Actors performing in a play at Sangeet Natya Academy.

The play ‘Andher Nagari Chaupat Raja’ was staged at Lucknow’s Sangeet Natya Academy on Friday. Sangam Bahuguna directed this famous play of Bhartendu Harishchandra. This play satirized the rule of the mindless and unrestrained king and showed him ending himself.

The story of the play was like this, a Mahant reaches the outskirts of the city with two of his disciples, Govardhan Das and Narayan Das. Mahant then sends both of them to beg for alms. Govardhan reaches a city market in search of alms. There he gets to see sweets, samosas, fish, kebabs and much more. He also meets many traders in the market.

During this, artists tell about the city through poetry on stage. Seeing this, the audience clapped a lot. Then while buying sweets, Govardhan asks the sweet seller the name of the city. The name Mithaiwala suggests, ‘Andher Nagri’. Govardhan asks ‘Who is the king here’? So the answer is ‘Chaupat Raja’.

Seeing the actors performing, the audience applauded a lot.

Govardhan reaches Mahant with sweets. He says that this city is very good because everything is available here at low cost. He asks Mahant to stay in Andher Nagri only. But Mahant does not agree and leaves from there with another disciple. During this, the tradesman approaches the king with a request for his goat to be buried under the wall.

The king is so stupid that he orders to punish the mason of the wall under which the goat was buried. The needle of punishment started from the mechanic reaches the policeman. But the gallows is bigger than the Kotwal’s neck. Then the mindless king orders to find the neck of the size of the noose.

Meanwhile, Govardhan is sleeping in the city after eating sweets. The king’s soldiers bring him to the gallows by wearing a noose. Then Mahant reaches there and says, “The one who will be hanged in this Muhurta, will get a place in Vishnu Lok”. In this way, the mindless, stupid king ends up hanging himself on the noose.

artist on stage