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Synopsis

The story of Lakshmi is based on an actual case of a woman who was sucked into the vortex of a self-fulfilling prophecy, ending in institutionalized psychiatric treatment. The substance of the case has been retained. The circumstances have been fictionalized to serve the purpose of dramatization. The platform for the play script is the work of Thomas Szasz and reveals the underlying concerns in the play about the precipitation of mental illness by the very act of psychiatric diagnosis and intervention. Szasz, a respected psychiatrist himself, questioned the bonafides of the “mental illness industry” in his classic publications, The Myth of Mental Illness and The Manufacture of Madness. Taking the cue, we might in fact benefit from a re-examination of all forms of dogma and all institutionalized faiths – especially the way they might be perpetrating problematic behaviours towards their own indispensability. The play works on the story of Lakshmi, a young, vivacious, newly married woman, who is systematically broken down into a “classic” psychiatric syndrome. We have no difficulty in recognizing her condition as a mental illness, nor in giving the condition an appropriate label. But we do not easily see how the steadily deteriorating condition might be on account of the label itself. The human spirit resists the intrusion, but it is an unequal match against the temple. The resistance can become another symptom, and thus a liability, inviting upon herself more attention, more ‘treatment’.

Duration

100   Minutes

No of characters

12