Amit Ohdedar

Amit Ohdedar co-founded Prayas Theatre in 2005, establishing what would become New Zealand’s first community theatre company performing South Asian plays in English.

Originally from Kolkata, Amit has spent three decades in Auckland building bridges between South Asian theatre and New Zealand audiences. He gravitated towards theatre driven by a desire to share these stories with wider audiences at a time when, as he puts it, “community theatre doing South Asian work was very few.”

Over two decades, Amit has directed seven major productions for Prayas, including Tagore’s Kingdom of Cards, Shahid Nadeem’s Dara, and the landmark 2023 staging of the 5th-century Sanskrit classic The Clay Cart (Mricchakatika) — co-directed with Sananda Chatterjee. His work with Prayas has been the subject of a published interview in Theatre Journal (Johns Hopkins University Press), alongside Indian Ink’s Jacob Rajan, examining South Asian intercultural theatre in New Zealand.

Now serving as Honorary President, Amit continues to mentor emerging artists and advise the committee on artistic direction. His vision — that South Asian theatre belongs on New Zealand stages, told in English, for everyone — remains the foundation of everything Prayas does.