Archana Gupta
Manjula Padmanabhan’s one of the most remarkable plays, Harvest (1997), is a family dystopia in which global capitalism, technology, biopolitics, and gendered identity intersect to commodify the human body. The constant use of artificial intelligence and surveillance technologies in everyday life deeply impact common human beings which is very well substantiated through the play Harvest. The paper critiques bodily control and intersected identities by raising pertinent ethical and social concerns. This paper critically examines how the play's technological equipment — particularly the Contact Module, and the disembodied figure of Ginni — functions as a means of surveillance and commodification, thereby reducing the body to a mere transferable commodity in the global marketplace. The current study examines the theoretical concepts of surveillance in conjunction with feminist theories of body politics. The paper also highlights how female characters, especially Jaya, resist technological and patriarchal control through strategies of bodily autonomy and refusal. With its focus on interwoven multiple narratives the paper attempts to situate Harvest within contemporary debates on AI ethics, bio capitalism, and gendered agency. The paper focuses on the intersections of AI, surveillance and gender in Harvest. On the other hand, it also examines the dehumanizing effects of techno-capitalism and provides a framework for imagining resistance. The play thus becomes an essential cultural text for interrogating power, technology, and the politics of the gendered body in the twenty-first century.