Sabitri Heisnam

Sabitri Heisnam
From the play, Pebet
Born	(1946-01-05) 5 January 1946 (age 71) Mayang Imphal, Manipur, India
Occupation	Stage actor
Years active	Since 1950s
Known for	Manipuri theatre
Spouse(s)	Heisnam Kanhailal
Awards	Padma Shri Sangeet Natak Akademi Award Manipur State Kala Akademi Award Cairo International Festival Critics' Award Nandikar Award Natya Ratna

Sabitri Heisnam is an Indian stage actor and one of the notable theatre personalities in Manipuri theatre. She has also acted in the critically acclaimed short film, Scribbles on Akka (2000), directed by Madhushree Dutta, which won the IDPA Award, best script award at Shanghai International Film Festival and the National Film Award for Best Anthropological Film. She is a recipient of the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award of 1991. The Government of India awarded her the fourth highest civilian honour of the Padma Shri, in 2008, for her contributions to Manipuri theatre.

Sabitri Heisnam, née Sabitri Devi, was born on 5 January 1946 in a Meitei family in the periphery of Mayang Imphal in the northeast Indian state of Manipur. Gouramani Devi, her aunt and a known stage actor, trained Devi from a young age and introduced her to theatre as a child artist, the lead role in Nimai Sanyas as 'Nimai' and as 'Queen Chintamani' in Shri Vasta-Chintamani were two of her notable early performances. Her career took a turn with her performance in Layeng Ahanba (first treatment), directed by Heisnam Kanhailal in 1961, and she married Kanhailal the next year; she was also a part of the group led by him who would found Kalakshetra Manipur in 1969.

Sabitri Heisnam has made many notable performances on various stages in India and abroad, including Japan and Egypt; 'Ekhoulangbi' in Ekhoulangbi (1970), 'widow mother' in Tamnalai (1972), 'old woman' in Kabui Keioiba (1973), 'mother pebet' in Pebet (1975), 'tribal woman' in Laigi Machasinga (1978), 'Mi' in Memoirs of Africa (1985), 'Thambam' in Migi Sharang (1990) and 'Radha' in Karna (1997) are some of her major productions under Kalakshetra. Her portrayal of Draupadi, in the drama of the same name based on a short story by Mahasweta Devi, made news as the final moments of the play saw her dropping her clothes one by one and stripping naked on stage. After its first two stagings on 14 April and 20 April in the year 2000, the performance evoked public protest for deemed obscenity, but is known to have inspired a group of twelve women to stage a protest by parading naked in front of Army personnel in 2004 who were alleged to have raped and killed a woman. The role of a young boy, enacted by her while she was in her sixties, in Dakghor, a drama based on one of Rabindranath Tagore's short stories, was another performance which drew critical acclaim.