Veteran Bengali playwright Chandan Sen’s play holds up a mirror to autocracy and shrinking freedom

Published 8 August 2026 · local

Kolkata As freedom of speech and the rise of autocratic rule grip people across the globe, senior Bengali playwright Chandan Sen spoke about the rising

Kolkata As freedom of speech and the rise of autocratic rule grip people across the globe, senior Bengali playwright Chandan Sen spoke about the rising issues through his play. The last show of the play was staged at Kolkata's iconic Academy of Fine Arts in the Rabindra Sadan area on Thursday (August 6, 2026). Sen, who has himself spent several days behind bars during his younger days for speaking up against the system through his art, said that a crackdown on art and freedom of speech is gripping everyone in society. The play “Ak Nayok-er Sesh Raat” (The last night of a hero) has had multiple shows across the country.

It is set in an imaginary place called “Blue Land” where a military dictator’s last night unfolds through the play before he is gunned to death by the government, which replaces him. But during the 1hr 35 minutes of the play, the audience also realises that the “democratically elected” government which comes to replace the military regime is also similarly fascist, but in better clothes and better verbal articulation. “The play is inspired by everything that is happening around us across the world; the dictator does not believe in education, he cracks down on institutes; he tries to rewrite history... Those are things we are seeing in our everyday lives,” Mr. Sen told The Hindu.

According to Tapan Biswas, a senior actor in the play, theatre groups like them are suffering from a serious budget crunch, and the lack of support or concessions from any government has pushed them against the wall. “We all have to compromise on our freedom of expression for fear of a crackdown. We have to add gimmicks and frivolous things just to get more audience and sustain,” Mr. Biswas said. Biswas looked back on their younger days as theatre artists when neither artists nor writers shied away from making their art political and showing a mirror of society to the people. West Bengal has produced stalwart playwrights like Badal Sarkar, Utpal Dutta, and many more who spoke truth to power through their plays.

People of Bengal used to stand in long queues to get a ticket to their plays, which spoke about politics, society, justice, human life and the atrocities of the State, but those days are gone, says Mr. Sen. He adds that now if they spend around ₹60,000 for one play, they are hardly able to make ₹20,000 through ticket sales. “We have to give the rest from our own pockets to sustain this art for the love of this art,” the 82-year-old playwright says.