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A CRY OF HUNGER IN THE HUNGRY ONES

Among Asif Currimbhoy’s plays The Hungry Ones (1965) represents well his artistry. It presents a poignant cry of hunger, poverty and conscience. Beginning with the visit of the American beatnik poets � Allen Ginsberg and Peter Orlovsky � to Calcutta, the play presents with greater penetration into all manifestations of hunger in the riot-torn and the famine­-stricken capital of Bengal.

The Hungry Ones is a one act play, with twelve fast moving scenes in a rapid succession. The very opening scene presents the yogic feats of the Americans, and the ‘hungry act� of an Indian and his wife. The Americans are delighted at having made their initial friendship with the two Indians. The Indians still seem to maintain their reserve in terms of the ‘hungry� act. This of course arouses the curiosity of the Americans who now desperately want to join them in this game they do not yet understand. The initial success comes from the fact that they have got the Indians to participate in their frolicsome game.

The two Americans trudge wearily through the hovels of Calcutta in search of the Indians who played the hungry act earlier. They want to unravel the secret of the Indians. They see along the footpaths, rows and rows of maimed and deformed beggars. Some are seen begging alms, some moaning softly, some, bearing patiently their distress and some waiting fully for help. The rickshaw-man pleads with the two Americans for their compassion towards the beggars. He pleads for compassion for the suffering, which has burned him the hunger for life and the hunger for death. It shows the agony which rushes out from the playwright’s own intention out of compassion, sympathy and humanism towards the poor and deformed beggars.

The play starts from about the hungry-generation from the hovels of Calcutta, through there was a definite sense of identification with the beatnik­-poets. But it develops with greater penetration in all manifestations of hunger in the riot-torn and famine capital of Bengal. Currimbhoy contrasts the beatnik practice of yoga and meditation and the Indian and his wife’s performance of the hungry act. There is a strange correlation between the yogic­-beatnik of America and the meditative yogi of India, between the Black Muslim of America and the Islamic Muslim of Bengal. The Beggar’s description of privation makes Sam to think on it. Sam looks at the beggar, dumbfounded. Being a Black Muslim of America, he has not been able to participate nor identify himself with them in the manifestation of the faith what he professes to be the same as theirs.

Sam and Al are at loss to understand how Razia, the beggar, was able to give alms to so many. They finally understand that Ramesh has earned food by means of hard work. They approach Razia and offer her food by telling her that they have learnt how to earn food. But she asks them to save Ramesh from the enemies. Immediately, they run to the refugee camp in search of Ramesh and fling themselves at him but are frightened because they have not yet unravelled the mystery of India. The play comes to a close as they leave for America, bidding farewell to Razia who is broken, shattered and who yearns for the love of her husband, Ramesh.

Thus, The Hungry Ones presents a realistic picture of the streets of Calcutta where beggars walk like shadows and where one may witness scenes of riot and arson. The two Americans go round the streets and hovels of the city of Calcutta. They even visit the refugee camp where disease, deformity and despair of life, reflecting the misery of the unhappy lot in the contemporary Indian society. The very opening scene presents the yogic feats of the two Americans, and the hungry act of an Indian and his wife. The eleven scenes that follow are quick-moving, thereby permitting rapidity of action.

Furthermore, Currimbhoy succeeds in producing visual and auditory images which stimulate the minds, the ears and the eyes of his audience. The fascination of the students for the beatniks, the refugees in the streets of Calcutta, the scenes of riots, the recitation of hymns from the Indian epics by the Guru and the saying of prayers by the Muslims during the Mohurrum produce the visual and auditory images which make the play successful on the stage. Thus The Hungry Ones is most characteristic of Currimbhoy’s works and it is extremely theatrical, strong and determined, a tense statement about man and about India in very physical but compassionate terms.