BANGALORE, June 9 -- When sexual volition of women is under attack, what chance does alternate sexuality stand in a state that criminalises it? How do young people with alternate sexuality feel within a restrictive, didactic social structure? How do their parents feel when confronted by the truth of their children's sexuality?Late Marathi playwright Chetan Datar wrote Ek Madhav Baug, a few years ago to address questions that continue to stay relevant till date.

Mona Ambegaonkar, TV, theatre and film actor, director and writer, who has been an outspoken activist for LGBT rights picked the play a few years ago and translated it in English and Hindi.

She tours the country with it, often staging it in education institutions and corporate spaces because that is where discrimination can be the most debilitating.

She often brings the play to Bangalore and was in the city recently and chatted with City Express.

The law continues to dictate sexual choices...

The play's relevance has increased, to my mind, given that the current ruling party is closely affiliated to the RSS and its leaders have often voiced their intolerance to sexual minorities in public and through the press. Also, Section 377 makes all sexual minorities vulnerable to exploitation and threats and fear tactics, even if they are heterosexual.

What was the starting spark for this play?

The play had two births. One was in 1998 when it was read in the office of the Humsafar Trust - which continues to push it into the public arena even today and also uses it as an advocacy tool for sexual minorities - and the other was at Kashish International Queer Film Festival.

The first time the play was read, the playwright was alive and the play was very relevant but perhaps ahead of its time. It was also read in the language it was originally written in - Marathi.

The second time it came...