Theatre group introduces medical insurance for members

Theatre actor Satish Shaw’s untimely demise after a prolonged ailment shook the theatre world recently. Debesh Chattopadhyay, by his own admission, learnt an important lesson from this incident and introduced medical insurance for all the members of his group, Sansriti. The director has also pleaded other groups, who get grants from the government. “The state government provides medical insurance to the members of West Bengal Motion Picture Artists Forum. In theatre, however, we do not get such facilities. Satish’s death was an eye-opener for me. So, we have introduced medical insurance for our team members,” the director said.

There are 22 members in Sansriti. “Out of them, 10 workers did not have any medical insurance. Hence, we started with these 10 artistes, including Gambhira Bhattacharya, who is not our member but has been working with us for a while now,” Debesh said. The current insurance will cover up to Rs 2 lakh for medical expenses.

Debesh has also made an appeal to the theatre community through his social media handle. “Film artistes get the same support from the government. We do not know yet if anything can be done for the theatre workers. But the groups that get government grants can come forward. This is just a proposal. After posting it online I got a very good response. Many people are willing to come forward,” he said.

Satish Shaw was diagnosed with oral cancer last year. The theatre fraternity came forward and raised funds for his treatment.

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