‘Canteen Theatre’ runs community kitchen to feed the poor in Howrah
Times of India | 15 April 2024
Kolkata: A 50-member theatre group — ‘Canteen Theatre’ — stages plays across the city to raise funds for running their community kitchen that caters to around 300 underprivileged people at Shibpur in Howrah. Under this initiative — launched during Covid-19 induced lockdown in 2020 — daily meals are given to slum dwellers in nearby areas and factory workers at subsidized rates.
The group has been set up by Joyraj Bhattacharya, a noted actor-cum-director, and Arko Mukhaerjee, a popular musician in the city, with the help of its other members.
Each beneficiary has to collect a coupon, priced at Rs 30, a day in advance to get their meals, usually comprising rice, ‘daal’, vegetables, egg/fish or chicken.
Some popular productions of the group include ‘Lakkhoner Shaktishel’ (Laxman shellshocked), ‘Titu Mir’, ‘Ekti Uttaradhunik Samajik Pala,’ ‘Mitra Ke Niye Ki Korite Hobe’, among others. Earlier, the group members were associated with different social welfare activities like providing relief to cyclone and flood-affected people.
“Howrah has many poverty-stricken people, living in slums. Many are in dire straits due to jute mill lockouts. So, we started the initiative in this district.Dancer and actor Srabanti Bhattacharya, who performs in ‘Lakkhoner Shaktishel’, and dance practitioner and academician Sandra Babli, oversee the community Kitchen,” Joyraj told TOI. “We cleaned up a patch of 1.5 cottah, which was used for dumping of garbage, and started cooking there with temporary arrangements. Later, the land owner turned up and told us to vacate the land. Then we purchased the land with the help of funds raised from our productions and built the community kitchen,” he recounted.
Arka Das, drummer for the popular city band Easy Riders and one of the twin music directors of the play, ‘Lakkhoner Shaktishel’,said, “The kitchen is an initiative to give back to the community and I am happy being part of such an initiative .”