मांडिता कैवार

"Mandita Kaiwar" is a Marathi translation of an English play named "Taking Sides".
It raises some fundamental questions about the relations between Art and Politics,Artist and the socity and the artist's sociopolitical responsibility.

A tale based on the life of Wilhelm Furtwangler,one of the most spectacular and renowned conductors of the 30s to 50s of Berlin Philharmonic, whose tenure coincided with the controversial Nazi era. . After the war, he was investigated as part of the Allies' de-Nazification programme. An American major,Steve Arnold, is given the Furtwangler file, and is told to find everything he can and to prosecute the man ruthlessly. Tough and hard-nosed, Major Steve Arnold sets out to investigate a world of which he knows nothing. Orchestra members vouch for Furtwangler's morality--he did what he could to protect Jewish players from his orchestra. To the Germans (and to Arnold's colleagues also), deeply respectful of their musical heritage, Furtwangler was a demigod; to Major Arnold, he is just a lying, weak-willed Nazi.
Actually, it practically shakes down Furtwangler for answers. How much consorting with Hitler and the gang did he do? Do you have to be a member of the Nazi Party to be of the Nazis? And is art really any kind of excuse for casting a blind eye on evil?
This engaging inquiry unfolds and suggests the nature of dilemmas, collective cowardice and opportunism, ‘convenient ignorance’ of the society as whole when confronted with might and ugly face of evil empire!