A thunderous reverberation filled up the auditorium of the Mahatma School Baba building this Monday evening. No, it was not due to the rain. It was a deafening applause for the eight young performers on the stage totally immersed in Gotipua, a traditional dance form of Odissi folk in praise of Lord Jagannath. Their graceful steps and flawless acrobatics held everybody in rapt attention. The surprise and charm of the movements was heightened when the audience realised that the performers were actually young boys dressed up as females.
Etymologically, ‘Gotipua’ in Oriya means ‘single boy’. But the dance is performed in groups. This dance form is said to have originated around the beginning of the 16th Century. Long ago, the temples in Orissa had female dancers called Maharis who were devoted to and performed for Lord Jagannath. When the Mahari dance form started declining, the male dancers continued the tradition by dressing up as the female dancers. Although the Gotipua dance follows the Odissi style, the technique, costumes and presentation are different from that of the Mahari dance. In Gotipua, the dancers themselves sing.
The dance form is not an easy one to master, as it requires rigorous training and regular practice. The boys are recruited to learn the dance at a very young age, and undergo training until their adolescence, when their androgynous appearances begin to change. Many masters of the Odissi dance form started off as being Gotipua dancers in their youth, including Guru Kelucharan Mohapatra. The evening’s performers were from the famous Konark Natya Mandap in Puri. The performance started with the vandana, a three step salutation to Lord Jagannath, the guru and the audience. It was followed by four abhinayas, depicting poems from the Gita Govinda and Oriya bhajans.
The dancers performed with such grace and sensuality that it was difficult to notice that they were boys trained to dance in a feminine way. The icing on the cake was their final item, the Bandha Nritya , a combination of complex acrobatic feats and postures and graceful steps. Their last number, a brilliant piece of act, had the audience giving a standing ovation. The performers were accompanied by Guru Jayakrushna Nayak as the vocalist, Alok Ranjan Das on the mardala, Tapan Kumar Tarai and Sanjaya Kumar Pradhan as the other instrumentalists.
“The dancers were exemplary,” gushed Ms. Shanthi Ramoharan, the Vice Principal at the end of the programme.
The event was organized by the Tamil Nadu & Pondicherry chapter of the Society for the Promotion of Indian Classical Music And Culture Amongst Youth (SPIC MACAY), a voluntary youth movement which promotes intangible aspects of Indian cultural heritage by promoting Indian classical music, classical dance, folk music, yoga, meditation, crafts and other aspects of Indian culture.
