8
Gendered Violence and Female Agency in Indian  
Anti-Colonial Theatre 
Sreenisha Kanchiraju 
This essay was originally part of my 3rd Year Drama module ‘Theatre and Empire’, 
(DRA3110) a module which pushed for honest dialogue surrounding theatre and its 
place in (post-/ anti-) colonial narratives. In line with this, I compared an Indian and 
Canadian case study to find patterns within colonial narratives across the globe. As 
an Indian, the Indian case study Aur Kitne Tukde is particularly close to me, through 
which I wanted to explore how women are treated in anti-colonial narratives. 
Whilst this was a comparative essay, for the purpose of publishing within the  
journal, this contribution only focuses on Aur Kitne Tukde. Nevertheless, similar 
arguments can be made about productions from other colonial contexts, such as 
Canada, and the treatment of women which the essay explores is more universal, 
beyond India, but more significantly, beyond the West. 
Academic Mark Fortier proposes that one of the primary purposes of postcolonial 
theatre is “to challenge the canon of western art, a challenge which takes myriad 
forms, from outright rejection to reappropriation and reformulation” (2016:166). 
Through these many forms, postcolonial theatre can be seen as a method of  
reclaiming the identities that have been lost to and systematically  
deconstructed by practices of colonialism and imperialism. This essay aims to  
examine this reclaiming of identities, particularly of the identities of South Asian 
and black women, through a comparative analysis of Aur Kitne Tukde (2001),  
directed by Kirti Jain, and Lorena Gale’s Angélique (2000). Both plays present  
postcolonial theatre’s efforts to “challenge” colonial narratives and  
representations through common themes of patriarchy, misogyny, and gendered 
violence, whilst respectively addressing the different impacts of colonialism and 
imperialism within their own contexts of India and Canada.  
Colonial Context: India 
Aur Kitne Tukde, translating to ‘how many more pieces’ in English, is a Hindi play 
set in the 1940-50s and during the Partition of India, based on Urvashi Butalia’s The 
Other Side of Silence, first published in 1998. In this collection of interviews,  
providing voice to many survivors of the Partition and of the conflict that ensued, 
“Butalia gave importance to the silences and gaps of women in her interviews”, 
recognising that women were heavily “influenced by the presence of men” or were 
“silenced by the patriarchal pillars” (Chaithanya 2003:10). Kirti Jain’s production 
Anti-colonial perspectives, language and adaptation

View this content as a flipbook by clicking here.