Playwright: Rabindranath Tagore
Director: Gita Guha
Langage: Hindi
Duration: 45 minutes

Patni ka Patra is a one-woman theatre performance in Hindi, based on Rabindranath Tagore’s short story Streer Patra. A poor girl, Mrinal, is chosen by her mother-in-law because of her exceptional beauty, and married off to a rich man from Kolkata at the age of 12. After some time she conceives but loses her daughter to complications arising from a home delivery.
In the meantime, Bindu, an indirect relative from her husband’s side, arrives at their house. Unable to throw her out the family arranges her marriage with a mad boy. Bindu tries to adjust to her fate but cannot, and finally attempts suicide. Shocked by this incident Mrinal decides to leave the society where a woman has no identity or respect as a human being. She goes on a pilgrimage as an excuse to leave her husband, and writes this letter to him.
The script uses Tagore’s poems ‘Sabalaa’ and ‘Jhulan’.

In order to understand the cultural differences between Japan and India and share the same image among actors and directors, a short script based on the work In the Grove, by Japanese writer, Ryunosuke Akutagawa, was used. This story is about a man and a woman who are attacked by bandits in a grove, and who eventually come to different conclusions about what happened, based on their perspectives. The complexities of the plot reflect the parallel complexities of different identities in today’s world.