What if science proves the self-cleansing and purifying waters of this holy river? What if pharmaceutical companies recognise the healing potential of tiny, invisible bacteria-eating viruses in these swirling, murky waters and are willing to fund research? What if politico-religious nexus find a new platform for gaining power? What of the environmentalists agitating to clean up the filth polluting the river?
Would science and religion join hands for the first time ever?
When Uma, a young scientist from Bangalore, arrives in Allahabad to investigate the possibility that bacteriophages in the Ganga could be a starting point of a new era of disease eradication, she sets off a ripple effect that will impact the lives of several people. Dr. Ajay, a government doctor and staunch believer in cleaning up the river, represents the conventional wisdom of the medical profession entangled with his personal demons - a mother obsessed with religion, dying slum children, and a government that just doesn't care.
A colourful cast of characters including a self-promoting pujari, a scheming politician and a canny street urchin reveals that in India, everything is interconnected, and nothing is as simple as it seems.
THE INVISIBLE RIVER by Gautam Raja (scientific advisor Dr. Mukund Thattai of the National Centre for Biological Sciences, Bangalore, India) was developed for the Theatrescience Imagining the Future India festival in collaboration with Tinderbox Consultants, UK.
'Imagining the Future India 2007' culminated in October with JAGRITI organising a festival of play readings, performances, development workshops, school outreach programmes and seminars.
About the Parent Project
Established in 2004, Theatrescience is an initiative of the Theatre Royal Plymouth, UK, a project conceived by Tinderbox Consultants Limited which uses theatre to dramatise, develop and widen the worldwide debate about the practice and ethics of biomedical science. It uses theatrical techniques to illuminate and influence science, and it uses science to enrich and challenge theatre. In February 2003, Jeff Teare and Rebecca Gould began 'imaginingthefuture', funded by the Wellcome Trust, to bring playwrights and scientists in a safe space, to explore each others' worlds, lives and work.
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