Indian dancing

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KATHAK

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Tue dance att of the North is the complete antithesis of that of the South of India. The austerity and dignity that govern Bharata Natyam, steeped as it is in religious tradition, give place to a sensuous; dynamic quality expressive of joie de vivre. This is not surprising, for Kathak is the hybrid offspring of vastly different cultures.

While in the south dancing developed as a part of the life of the community and was associated with spiritual values, in the north the art was evolved putely for the pleasure of a people who revelled in outdoor pursuits and convivial living. Kathak, the love-child of Moghul-Hindu union, retains to a far greater degree the zest for life and the sensuality which it derives from its Arabic strain than the severity of the Hindu school. The main difference between the two gesture languages is that whereas the eloquence of Bharata Natyam is in its elaborate hand gestures, Kathak lays stress mostly on footwork.

The Kathak school owes its survival to Brindadin and to Kalkaptasad Maharaj. The three sons of Kalkaprasad — Achchanand, Lachchu, and Shambhu Maharaj — have in modern times preserved the old tradition inherited from their ancestors.

The home of Kathak, then, is the hardy north. In the Punjab, the United Provinces, Jaipur, and many of the States of Central India this type of dancing is, naturally enough, in great favour. With the rebirth of dancing as a whole, Kathak is also acquiring popularity amongst the people of the south, particularly among the ‘smarter sets’, to whom the tinsel-like charm and delicacy of the technique are far more understandable and pleasing than the austerity and rigid principles of Bharata Natyam, or the complicated pattern of Kathakali.

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