At a time when street artistes across India are having their livelihoods wiped out by the COVID-19 pandemic, the feisty spirit of octogenarian Shantabai Pawar — a Pune street performer skilled in lathi kathi (stick-wielding) — shines like a bright torch.
This redoubtable 80-year-old lady, with her consummate mastery of this ‘masculine’ martial art, wields sticks with the sort of astonishing energy that would put a teenager to shame.
A string of family tragedies, aggravated by the raging pandemic, has compelled this matriarch, who lives with her large family of more than 15 members, to perform once more on the streets to earn her daily bread.
“My parents had taught me to wield sticks since the age of eight. But today, my son in unwell. My second son has epileptic fits while another son has passed away. One of my daughters-in-law has died too, while another has deserted us. So, today, despite corona, I must fight and practice my art to earn bread for my grandchildren,” she says.
Despite warnings of older people being susceptible to the virus, Ms. Pawar, unruffled by the threat, has been out on Pune’s streets displaying her stick wielding prowess to earn a few rupees for her family.
After a scintillating lap, this ‘warrior grandmother’ humbly bows and points to her belly in hopes for a small gratuity doled out by a kind passer-by.
“People warned me not to go out saying that the virus will get me. But if I don’t go out, how will we eat? Who will give us freebies in these times?” she says.
However, her plaintive tone belies a steely determination to educate her grandchildren with whom she lives in a matchbox-sized home which is part of a slum cluster in Pune’s Hadapsar area.
At a time of widespread joblessness and despair in India’s fluid informal sector, Ms. Pawar says: “One has to go on fighting. It is tempting to pity oneself in such times. A doctor had once advised me never to beg, but to earn my living with dignity as I was an artiste.”
A video of Ms. Pawar performing with her sticks, made by a young woman, went viral on social media on Thursday and elicited adulation from Pune’s Police Commissioner Dr. K. Venkatesham.
“Talent has no boundaries,” tweeted Dr. Venkatesham. Bollywood actors Riteish Deshmukh and Sonu Sood, too, have expressed an interest in helping her.
Ms. Pawar, who had bit parts performing stunts in Bollywood blockbusters, used to be regularly seen at street corners performing her art with her ragtag troupe of children.
She began work in the 1972 blockbuster Seeta aur Geeta (1972) starring Hema Malini and Dharmendra, and also had parts in Sherni with Sridevi in 1988, and in Tridev (1989).
Ms. Pawar still cherishes a photograph of the late Bollywood actress with herself on the sets of Sherni.
“I have always made my living honestly, never asking for anything, unlike many others. I suppose that is the reason why God has blessed me with good health which many young people are bereft of. And if I must die, I’ll do so fighting on the streets, with my sticks” she says.
