Ashtavadhanam is always a great treat for the connoisseurs as well as the laymen. Mumaneni Subbarao Sidhardha Kala Peetham of Vijayawada presented an avadhanam session at Sidhardha Kala Kshetram with two women Avadhanis – a rare thing in itself — facing and spontaneously answering the puzzles posed by the pruchakas (questioners).
The Avadhanis were highly accomplished and young Bulusu Aparna and Pullabhotla Naga Santi Swaroopa. Both are well versed in Sanskrit and Telugu and are post graduates. They received intense training in Avadhana art from eminent scholar and poet Dhulipala Mahadeva Mani. They performed Ashtavadhanams successfully in many places like Hyderabad, Visakhapatnam, Guntur and Tirupathi receiving accolades, titles and awards. They were awarded the titles `Avadhana Raja Hamsini’ (Aparna) and ‘Satavadhana Sarada’ (Naga Santi Swaroopa) respectively.
At the start of the programme, the prolonged introduction of his disciples by their guru Mahadevamani and the disciples paying respects to their guru – all of course in poetic form, swallowed up nearly 20 minutes of valuable time. (Is the Guru’s presence really necessary on the stage?). The guru could have just explained the process of Ashtavadhanam in a simple manner and left the disciples to continue. For some time the audience was at a loss as to who is going to perform the Avadhanam – is it the guru or his disciples. Thus the mutual admiration part somewhat dampened the enthusiasm of the audience who were anxiously waiting to enjoy the performance of the two Avadhanis. However, the programme was successful and the Sidhardha Kala Peetham deserved credit for presenting this novel and rare event. The eight prucchakas were eminent scholars in the literary field. They are Palaparthy Syamalananda Prasad (Nishidhakshari), Pingali Venkata Krishna Rao (Samasya), Puvvada Tikkana Somayaji (Dattapadi), Gumma Sambasiva Rao (Varnana), Dhulipala Ramakrishna (Asuvu), Upadrashta Venkataramana Murthy (Vyastakshari), Inavolu Manjula (Ghantavadhanam) and M.Venkata Lakshmi (Aprastuta Prasangam). The programme was successfully conducted by Ch. Sunderarama Sarma and K. Manmadha Rao on behalf of the Kala Peetham.
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