Mysuru: There was a time when women stage artistes were looked down with contempt. However, that view has changed in recent times, said renowned Theatre Director and Padmashree B. Jayashree.

She was speaking at the 62nd Kannada Rajyotsava celebrations organised by Book Clubs 2015 at Mahajana PU College’s Swami Vivekananda auditorium, here yesterday and said that whenever anyone tried to put down the women stage artistes, she would throw a challenge at them, saying, “Come and perform on the stage if you have the guts and then talk about us.”

She recalled the times when her grandfather Gubbi Veeranna used to put up magical shows like Samudra Manthana, where there was no technology involved but still people would create the churning effects of the hills being pulled apart, and the sea waves parting by using pulleys and levers.

“I was not at all surprised when I watched a Broadway show in New York and the technology used in the theatre there, as my grandfather had achieved much more with bare human hands and imagination,” she said.

She was reacting to the readings from her autobiography titled ‘Kanna Muchhe Kade Gude,’ by journalist Preethi Nagaraj and went down the memory lane when she was studying in National School of Drama (NSD) at Delhi and how the news of her grandfather passing away reached her. “I did not know Hindi or English, when Ebrahim Al Kazi, the Director of NSD, gently broke the news to me in English, which I could not follow. It was then that my fellow actors of the likes of Naseeruddin Shah rallied around me to face the tough times,” she recalled.

Meera Nayak, this year’s State Rajyotsava awardee, who was felicitated on the occasion, said, “Once we are born all of us try to gain some knowledge or the other. Everyone has a responsibility to share this knowledge and experience with the society. Hence, I feel that honouring someone for serving the society is not very important as there are a lot more things to do.”

Jayashree shared a lighter moment on the stage between the two of them: “I asked Meera who has achieved much more than what I have, whether I could kiss her on the cheeks. She agreed and after I kissed her, she kissed me back and said, ‘This is the first time in my life I have been kissed by a woman,’” sending the audience into peals of laughter.

Preethi Nagaraj, during her reading of the book, reminisced how Jayashree was reluctant to be written about and how she still felt about lack of education and the complex it gave her because of this lacuna.

Jayashree mesmerised the audience with her singing from some of the plays like Lava Kusha, Nagamandala and Karimayi.

Founder Chairperson of Book Clubs 2015 Shubha Sanjay Urs welcomed. Yogini Nijaguna proposed a vote of thanks. Uma Parthanath compered     the programme.