Shillong, Nov 6: Gopinath Muthukad’s magic on Tuesday evening enthralled the defence personnel and others who were present at the event at the Assam Rifles camp, Happy Valley here.
His initiative was part of magic voyage- touring the country to empower the differently-abled persons.
The show
The wristwatch vanished from the box kept on the dais and reappeared in a different chest that was already given to another member in one corner of the audience. Loud cheers reverberated in the hall, as the internationally-acclaimed illusionist Muthukad’s opening trick before a crowd of over 2,000 people held aloft the spirit of his ‘Inclusive India’ cross-country expedition.
At the start of his 90-minute show here, Muthukad swung a flying disc at the gathering. The one who got it was called on to the stage and asked to deposit his wristwatch in a box on the table. The next minute, there was nothing inside it. The valuable property, though, was all safe and found inside a locked container Muthukad had first given to a seated onlooker.
“We call this technique ‘transportation’ in magic parlance. None of you saw the watch flying,” said a cryptically smiling Muthukad, winning another round of applause from the assembly. Top army officials from across the nation formed the core of the viewers along with their families and a set of local students, as the Shillong stopover marked the halfway of Muthukad’s two-month all-India expedition aimed at integrating the differently-abled with society.
At the core of the six-minute “Watch Your Watch’ item is the expansion of each letter of the key word. “See, ‘W’ stands for ‘words’, ‘A’ for ‘action’, ‘T’ for ‘thought’, ‘C’ for ‘collaboration’ and ‘H’ for ‘humane behaviour,” he explains. “The choice of words to refer to the differently-abled is very important. ‘Deaf’, ‘dumb’, ‘handicapped’ are all insensitive.”
As for ‘thought’, “We must constantly make efforts to break the barriers for the differently-abled to ensure their integration with society at large. This must be carried out through ‘action’ that works to their physical and emotional benefit. For that, we must get engage in ‘collaboration’. It requires empathy and not sympathy, which makes our behaviour ‘humane’,” he pointed out.
Hailing Muthukad after his dozen-odd tricks, Major General Jai Singh Bainsla, Additional DG at Assam Rifles, said the show was an eye-opener for him and colleagues. “The messages here led to me those ideals about which I had paid little attention all these years,” he said. Similar response came from Commandant Suresh Bose.
As the show concluded with the national anthem featuring Amitabh Bachchan on the screen with the sign language of the lyrics, students from a local school for differently-abled rose and joined the megastar’s gestures.
The next show in the 41 stop series is at Sikkim capital Gangtok on Thursday.
Sixty-year old Muthukad, a recipient of the coveted Merlin Award (2016) considered as Oscar in magic, heads an NGO named Different Art Centre which is steering the mission that enjoys non-financial support from the Union Government’s Department of Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities under the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment.
The magician’s trip, which began from Kanyakumari on October 6 (World Cerebral
Palsy Day), has stopovers along the central plains, the hilly east, Gujarat in the west and Jammu & Kashmir up north before culminating in the national capital on December 3 (International Day for Persons with Disabilities).
“Our voyage covers all the states. We campaign across the mainland with a total of 41 events that includes the inauguration and culmination,” he pointed out.
Muthukad has the credit of launching the trailblazing ‘Magic Planet’. Based in Thiruvananthapuram, it is the world’s first such theme park that protects public-oriented art forms and street performers. Its goals are familiarising the public with wizardry, reviving street tricks and employing this art to empower the marginalised.
The December 3 culmination event in New Delhi will see the participation of ministers and other parliamentarians besides top government officials. This is Muthukad’s fifth such all-India venture using magic to spread social messages.
