Ravindranath Tagore’s ‘Chandalika’ came alive in the city, with renowned danseuse Sobha Naidu playing the poignant title role in a dance drama organised by Mummaneni Subba Rao Kalapeetham here on Saturday. Ms. Naidu became an interpreter of the theme even as her team of performers presented their roles to perfection. The theme denounces the practice of untouchability, a scourge that had weakened society.
‘Chandalika’ was meticulously presented, and the dancers gave a gripping presentation, which kept audiences glued to their seats. The dance was choreographed by Ms. Sobha Naidu’s guru Vempati Chinna Satyam.
Nitya Subhaprada as Chandalika’s mother Maya and Sujatha Murthy as Anand stood out. The ballet, presented through six scenes, narrated the suffering of ‘Chandalika’, an innocent girl who was treated as an untouchable by society. Chandalika wakes up one morning to be denied even the basic necessities of life. People curse and chide and brand her as an untouchable. Enraged, the young girl asks her mother as why she was brought to the world that ill-treats her. She finds a ray of hope when a Buddhist monk, Anand, treats her as a fellow human being. She weaves her own fantasy of romance around the monk. After several plots and sub-plots the story ends with Chandalika’s initiation to Buddhism.
