Biography
Kumara Varma was born in April 1945 in Mavelikkara, Kerala. After completing his BSc, he joined the National School of Drama in 1964 and left in 1967 with the prestigious Bharat Puraskar and Girish Ghosh Puraskar. During 1967–68, he worked in the Repertory Company of the NSD and directed Hori (a dramatized version of Premchand’s Godaan) for which the set was designed by Ebrahim Alkazi.
Between 1968 and 1973 Kumara Varma was actively involved in the Natakakalari movement (New-theatre Movement) in Kerala, organizing workshops and directing plays in collaboration with playwrights such as C. N. Srikanthan Nair, G. Sankara Pillai and Kavalam Narayana Panikkar. Some of his productions of this period include Nair’s Saketam, Pillai’s Bandi and Panikkar’s Sakshi.
Varma joined the Faculty of the Department of Indian Theatre at Panjab University in 1973 as Lecturer and later became Professor. He has also chaired the Department and has been the Dean of the Faculty of Design and Fine Arts. He was also formerly a Secretary of the Punjab University Teachers Association (PUTA). Kumara Varma was awarded the Italian Government Scholarship in 1979 and studied the History of Theatre and Drama at the University of Rome. Besides having represented India in the UNESCO World Theatre Conference at Paris in 1980, he has also studied theatre in many countries.
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