With fear and insecurity at the back of their mind, people still venture forth with family and friends
The current attacks and the wave of anxiety and apprehension have had a negative impact on the performing arts in the country. Performing arts, unlike some other art forms, require to be performed live with the audience participation being one of the three angles of the triangular formation, the other being the artist and the art form. Without the inclusion of the audiences the tripartite arrangement is left incomplete.
This also provides an occasion for people to gather at one place and, hence, facilitate interaction among them. The audience response conditions the performance and, hence, it carries different nuances every time as the actors/vocalists react creatively to that. It is never repetitive.
Over the past many years the number of performances: be it music, dance, theatre, or even that of the stand-up comedians have been on the decline. One basic barometer for judging this has been the number of international shows and performances. This has shown a great decline in number because many do not come to Pakistan for security concerns.
Many of the artists or groups that have been coming to the country even when conditions were far from ideal, insist on coming again but are stopped or discouraged by their own people and governments.
Many countries have issued travel advisories against visiting Pakistan for even occasions like conferences or meetings, let alone a performance which has to be public, to say the least.
The last fully international festival to be held by the Rafi Peer Group was in the year 2008 and it was disrupted by a series of explosions. Luckily, no one was seriously hurt but it was enough to scare people away and instill an element of fear. It was shifted by them to their own venue at Raiwind Road, which has a more controlled environment and is also away from the city centre.
Three or four groups from abroad participated. Only last year, they again held a number of concerts of music at the Alhamra Cultural Complex but the local administration was hell bent on putting security ahead of everything and most reluctant to give the necessary clearance. It was after a lot of effort and pulling of strings that the Peerzadas were allowed to host the event. A few days later, the tragic incidence of Peshawar happened and it then put an end to all outdoor activities.
All the schools and colleges have been ordered by the Punjab government not to hold cultural events on their premises. Schools and colleges, which have started to look like fortresses with just classes and academic work conducted and no extra-curricular activity, which means that education has been rendered incomplete.
Extra curricular activity is just as important as curricular activity and many students only learn out of class, preferring it over the tedium of bookish knowledge. In institutions of higher learning students learn more in an informal atmosphere than the more formal one, narrowed down to teaching and being taught in the conventional sense.
The All Pakistan Music Conference, which held its annual 5-day event at the Open Air Bagh-e-Jinnah had to change the venue to the more secure and controlled environs of the Alhamra on the Mall. For years there was this debate about security. The traditionalists often prevailed but then the situation got so bad that it had to be shifted, which resulted in changing the entire ethos of the 5-day event held and participated in by a large number of people.
The open air was ideal for the event as people moved in and out given their choice of the performer, without causing undue disturbance. Even while listening they enjoyed the freedom that the open air environment offered, moving, eating, drinking and smoking, causing less of a disturbance than what the closed controlled environment would have demanded.
It was quite common for music events to be held at the various venues -- some formal the others improvised or makeshift -- depending on the nature of the programme but now one has to think many a time before taking the decision. The dice is always cast in favour of a venue that can be secured.
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It was not so long ago that many groups came to perform in Pakistan from various countries of the world, particularly from the United Kingdom, France, Germany, and the United States. Their cultural centres hosted plays, music programmes and exhibitions in which people participated happily. The Iranian centres, too, were relatively more active but these days all have kept a low profile and have actually withdrawn from the scene temporarily.
The theatre scene, too, is more or less the same. Earlier, even if the state did not permit, plays were staged in open areas, houses of individuals, and in rural spaces. But now it has to be a proper theatre hall that guarantees some semblance of security. Ironically, the halls are thrown open to the performers which were discouraged earlier, an indication of changing times.
It was a good omen that the British Council decided to reopen their library facility in Pakistan. More details were not announced and no news has been heard since the Peshawar incidence but this was welcomed. Scores of generations benefited from the library facilities of various cultural centres in the country. When a book was not available elsewhere it was to be found in their facilities.
Many of the programmes are now recorded in the security of the studios and then beamed across for people to view on the screens in the safety of their homes. But a recorded show is bereft of the vibrancy of a live show. The instant rapport is missing.
It is no wonder that people with fear and insecurity at the back of their mind still venture forth with their families and friends. It is because of such people that public events, albeit in smaller numbers, are still held.
The literature and cultural festivals, which have spawned in the last few years, are treated as half-way houses to the performing arts. People want to see and meet the writers in flesh and blood and interact with them. They are no longer content with the objectivity of the printed word.