Akhilesh Chandra Saxena
Bareilly: On the third day of the Fourth Theatre Festival Rang Mahotsav Indradhanush 2024, the play ‘Kismat Palace’ was staged by Eklavya Theatre Dehradun under the direction of Akhilesh Narayan in the auditorium of SRMS Riddhima.
The play begins with film producer and director Jai Singh Aidanwala, who becomes a victim of an accident due to drunk driving. A young man Subhash Kumar saves him from death and goes to drop him home. After reaching the bungalow, Jai Singh calls Subhash inside to thank him.
He introduces him to his wife Mallika and makes him his driver. But Mallika does not like this decision and tries to expel Subhash from the house by framing him in the charge of theft. However, due to Subhash’s intelligence, she is not successful. Mallika wants to get Rs 24 crore of his life insurance by killing debt-ridden Jai Singh.
Jai Singh calls Subhash and Mallika and gives Subhash a letter and tells Mallika about a small change he made in his insurance policy. As per the terms of the policy, the insurance amount could be claimed only if Aidanwala is murdered and not himself.
Aidanwala says that he knows Mallika will try to show his suicide as murder. Saying this, he shoots himself. Mallika rushes to call the police but Subhash convinces her that together they can prove his suicide as murder. Subhash offers to cooperate with her on the condition that they will split the insurance amount equally. Mallika is initially hesitant but eventually accepts Subhash’s offer when he reveals the letter he was asked to give to legal advisor Advocate Merchant, which claims that Aidanwala had asked Merchant to release Mallika from jail if she succeeds in proving his death to be a murder, and then give the letter to the insurance company so that they do not pay him.
They then hide Jai Aidanwala’s body in the freezer and erase all evidence of Aidanwala’s death from the house. Both of them pretend that Aidanwala is sick. Both of them make a plan to turn the suicide into a murder. According to which Subhash leaves the house with Mallika to go to the nursing home, disguising himself as Aidanwala and hiding his face.
He ties Mallika in the car and drives off, so that it looks like goons have framed him and kidnapped Aidanwala. CBI ACP Gokhale calls Advocate Merchant to Aidanwala’s house and questions him about the night of the disappearance. Merchant tells Gokhale that Aidanwala did not make a will. Merchant then tells Subhash that Aidanwala made a will and handed it over to Subhash to save his life.
This information puts Subhash under suspicion. Subhash tells Merchant the truth and claims that Mallika planned the whole thing. Merchant decides to take advantage and tries to get Subhash to sign a power of attorney so that Merchant can get both the insurance money and the will.
When Subhash refuses, Merchant takes Swati at gunpoint, but the police arrive with ACP Gokhale. Subhash blames Merchant for Aidanwala’s death. Seeing himself trapped, Merchant shoots Subhash but by then Gokhale shoots Merchant, killing Merchant and Subhash becomes the new owner of Kismat Palace. Gokhale congratulates Subhash. Then Mallika comes and gives him the will. In the play, Jagriti Kothari, Priyanshu Bisht, Jai Singh Rawat, Hrithik Seemalti, Hemlata Pandey, Krishna Nand performed brilliantly in their roles. Before this, Additional Commissioner Income Jyotsna Devi, Councilor Rajesh Agarwal, Founder and Chairman of SRMS Trust Dev Murti ji, Secretary Aditya Murty lit the lamp. On this occasion, Asha Murty , Richa Murty, Usha Gupta, Subhash Mehra, Dr. MS Butola, Dr. Prabhakar Gupta, Dr. Anuj Kumar, Dr. Rita Sharma and other dignitaries were present.
