On the 13th of August, peace activists from different parts of India gathered in Amritsar to celebrate the independence of India and Pakistan and reaffirm their resolve to work for peace between the two countries. Later they went on to light lamps in the darkness of the Wagah Border. It was an emotional occasion – and a special one for me, because it was dedicated to Madeeha Gauhar, tireless peace campaigner and my mother. She in fact had attended the lamp lighting ceremony on several occasions, sometimes from the Pakistani side of the border and sometimes from the Indian side. Borders were of no consequence to her. She loved crossing borders, breaking barriers. In fact, on one occasion when direct travel to India was not allowed, she went to the Indian Punjab via a Dubai –Delhi connection.

I remember accompanying my mother at one lamp lighting ceremony. Eminent peace activists had gathered at the border. They were waving hands, singing songs and spreading the light. Border force personnel were uneasy and suspicious. The crowds got excited to see Bollywood figures like Mahesh Bhatt, Gulzar and Raj Babbar and wanted to shake hands. I wanted Raj Babar’s autograph. My mother found us an opening and we were able to meet Gulzar and Raj Babbar. The Rangers did not like it and pushed us. In this process, my mother fell in a ditch. I remember how she got up like a lioness and slapped the pushy officer.Everyone who had known her knew that she could not be pushed around.

I am not sure what was her first passion – theatre or peace. She was equally dedicated and passionate for both. In fact she developed a platform which combined both: theatre for peace. The festivals she organised in India and Pakistan, which brought together theatre groups from both countries, were huge successes. She was so deeply committed to her work that when she was advised to have surgery for her Colon cancer, at a Delhi hospital, she arranged it in such a way that first she finished the Humsaya Theatre for Peace Festival in Delhi, attended a seminar at the Jawaharlal Nehru University and the next day got herself admitted to the hospital, surprising everyone involved!

My childhood memories are dominated by watching rehearsals at our house, part of which she had given to Ajoka. Initially there was a wall separating our house from Ajoka, but soon that wall, too, disappeared. Since my father Shahid Nadeem was equally involved with Ajoka, our house was Ajoka and Ajoka was our house.My first role with dialogues was Kala Meda Bhes, in which I uttered the lines “Mother I am hungry”. I learned acting before I learned to speak. In the PTV serial Neelay Hath, I was a 6-month-old baby of Bushra Ansari, a condemned prisoner. The serial ended with Madeeha holding me in her arms and saying “I will make you a good man and a good human being”.

Interestingly many years later, when I was attending an acting workshop in Amritsar, my mentor, Indian theatre teacher Vivek Mishra ended the workshop with these words “the most important thing for a good actor is to become a good human being”. I didn’t fully realise or understand what he had meant by that at that moment, but slowly I am starting to understand it. To be a good actor, one has to be a good human being: someone who is sincere and honest in their portrayal of their characters. One has to work truthfully. From archetypal characters to working with the mysterious force that is instinct, to the manipulation of the mind itself, one can only pass through this journey if first and foremost they are true to themselves, others and the world.

Nobody’s perfect, as they say, but we try to be. Perfection may be unattainable, but the ideal of a near-perfect actor is certainly achievable. Vivek sirasked us to draw a square diagram on the floor, split up into nine different boxes. Each box represented a different emotion, with a corresponding one right next to it. Standing in one box and saying a line allowed me to say the same line with different emotions. The emotion of anger, for example, has various ‘sub’ emotions; Irritation, Annoyance and finally ‘Anger’ itself. Similarly, there are varying degrees of Love, from ‘Attraction’, ‘Chemistry’ and then finally the act itself.

When PNCA suddenly withdrew permission to perform Ajoka’s Burqavaganza, she pulled a Madeeha. She pretended to be rehearsing another play and at the last moment, when the audience had settled in and the media cameras were in place, she switched to Burqavaganza. The play was a big hit, and so was the PNCA DG’s ego

Many people think an actor works from the heart. In fact it is quite the opposite. An actor works from the mind. You have no control over your emotions, however, you do have control over your mind. Building such a backstory to the character that your mind believes in it, allows the emotions to arise spontaneously. Don’t ‘try’ to cry. Develop the circumstances that allow you to. Don’t ‘try’ to get angry, happy, sad or funny. Develop a back-story in such detail that part of the mind believes in it, but not completely. That is the beauty of being an actor: two different realities, with, according to Stanislavsky, a third arising, a so-called “awareness”. Acting is all about ‘energy’ being exchanged, and the beauty of theatre is that during that moment, the audience experiences exactly what you do. But a good human being has to be a socially concerned human being as well. Social justice, exploitation, discrimination, hatred, violence, war – an actor cannot ignore these. Nor can they suppress their natural attraction to love, fraternity, humaneness, the essential goodness of human beings. That’s why in my view, acting is also acting for change, for goodness, for peace.

My mother was a fine actress, a great director and a fearless crusader for forgotten causes. She heroically challenged bigots, dictators and war-mongers. She was kind to the downtrodden and defiant towards people in authority. When she was visited by ‘intelligence’ agents after her visits to India, her disdain was lethal. Finally they gave up on her. She had serious encounters with the agencies hovering outside the High Commission of the not-so-friendly neighbour, and the adversary had to retreat. Now when Ajoka actors come out of the High Commission with their passports, the agency people retreat in a hurry on finding that they are Madeeha’s people. She was indeed a one-woman brigade. When PNCA suddenly withdrew permission to perform Ajoka’s Burqavaganza, she pulled a Madeeha. She pretended to be rehearsing another play and at the last moment, when the audience had settled in and the media cameras were in place, she switched to Burqavaganza. The play was a big hit, and so was the PNCA DG’s ego. Thus a prolonged confrontation about censorship of plays began, ending up before the Senate Committee on Culture. But she loved a good fight. She was a born fighter.

The 13th-August event was not the only tribute given to Madeeha by the Indian theatre community, peace lobby and the media. They loved her candidness and zest. She loved crossing the border and welcoming the Indian audience to her plays in her colourful sari. A tribute was held in Amritsar and another in Delhi. A theatre festival dedicated to Madeeha is being held from the 16th to 20th of August in Chandigarh. Another reference is being held in Delhi in the third week of August. Kewal Dhaliwal, a leading theatre director of India said at her reference, “She was a bridge of friendship and peace between the two countries. Alas that bridge has been broken.”

But the emotional tributes being held all over India show that the bridge is very much there. We have to guard it from both sides, for the sake of future generations of artists and peace-builders.