Abhijit Bhattacharya, a self-claimed fictional playwright, has prior allegations of stealing scenes from Hollywood-Bollywood or South Indian films and claiming it to be his own illustrious story for his theatrical play. “Lavita”, Jyoti Prasad’s play represented the people’s reaction during the Quit India Revolution in 1942s along with the wave of World War II that touched Assam.
Lavita was the lead character of the play based on an incident at Shalni Air Field in Tezpur. But Abhijit Bhattacharya claimed that this Lavita is not similar to Jyoti Prasad Agarwal’s Laviita and this is his Lavita. The song Krishna is also from another play of Rupkonwar Jyoti Prasad Agarwal. Instead of the slogan Vande Mataram, the copied Lavita contains of the slogan Bharat Mata Ki Jai.
Reacting to this controversy, Gyanshree Pathak Agrawal, Jyoti Prasad Agrawal’s daughter said, no one should not distort the works of Rupkonwar and urged them to present them in the correct form.
The Gananatya Sangha of India (GANS) has reacted and said that the distortion of Jyoti Prasad Agrawal’s immortal work Lavita is an unforgivable crime. They demanded that all quarters should boycott the play. In Rupkonwar’s Lavita, the character of Golap is depicted as a helpless, cowardly, worthless and inactive young man. Meanwhile in Abhijit Bhattacharya’s Lavita, he is portrayed as Krishna. Abhijit Bhattacharya’s play Lavita represents the complete reverse of the idea.
The Krishak Mukti Sangram Samiti (KMSS) has also reacted against the distortion of the Lavita play. Bidyut Kalita, General Secretary KMSS, alleged that with a purely commercial mentality, Abhijit Bhattacharya had distorted the play Lavita.