Collated by Tusar Nath Mohapatra
Mayurbhaj Chhau is a semi classical form of dance that portrays Indian culture, tradition, mythology and religion in a suave dreamlike manner. It is a very vibrant yet crisp form of story-telling and celebrating culture and traditions. Identified to have great potential at conveying moral values and message of the great scriptures to common folk, this dance form which was popular only amongst the tribal communities of the eastern parts of India, was brought into mainstream theatre. Guru Krishan Chandra Naik has played an extremely important role in reviving of Mayurbhanj Chhau and helping it assume the status it enjoys today. It was him who laid the foundation for Chhau not only in SBKK but to other practitionor of this vibrant dance form. Without diluting the style he expanded its parameters. The work he started has found its way into all areas of the performing arts - dance, theatre, ballet and mime. After having been appointed by the Sangeet Natak Akademi to teach in the Shriram Bharatiya Kala Kendra in 1976. Naik staged the first Mayurbhanj Chhau ballet, Jagdev in 1977.. The press, the audience and the producers alike immediately saw in Chhau a form with universal appeal. This appeal lay in the fact that the spoken word along with stylized gesture and music understood by an elite few was not required to communicate the message of the dance.
From that point on, the Kendra has been presenting a series of ballets in Chhau, thus proving it as a style that is here to stay. Whether the theme is mythological or contemporary, Chhau has the basics to move the story forward. Some of the famous ballets of the Kendra are Jagdev, Konark, Kalingvijay, Khajuraho, Yayati, Karna, Kamayani, Masks, Buddha, Chaitraparv, Mahadev and Tripurantak. Solo dance pieces performed and/or created by the Kendra include Natraj, Dandi, Vishnugarud, Parshuram, Durga Mahishasur, Sikari, Kaal Chakra, Mahadev, Rituraj, Shantimantra, Varahavatar, Rativilap and Kalia Daman. Well known Chhau dancers having trained at the Kendra include Bharat Sharma, Bhushan Lakhandri, Harish Rawat, Kumkum Mathur, Madhuri Bhatia, Sharon Lowen, Daksha Seth, Shashidharan Nair, Kishore Sharma, Kamaljeet Wahengbam, Padam Gurung, Sunita Pandey and Narendra Kumar.
During his years at the Kendra, Krishna Chandra Naik sought to see that Mayurbhanj Chhau was recognized as a classical dance style. Towards that end he presented papers and lecture-demonstrations at various universities across India. In 1987 guru Krishna Chandra Naik was awarded a fellowship to write a book on Mayurbhanj Chhau. His ideas are still being transcribed by Shobha Deepak Singh. In the same year he fell seriously ill after completing the choreography of Chaitraparv. He was sent to Orissa for recuperation. However, his health took a turn for the worse. He was awarded the status of professor emeritus by the Government of India, an honour he was to avail of for only two months before he passed away.
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After the success of this experiment, the dance scenario in the B group got a further burst by the presence of another dance master, Dayal Sharana, who, soon after the staging of the Sadhava Jio nataka, came to Cuttack along with his troupe to present his dance repertoire at the Annapurna B theatre. While his performances did not seem to attract enough public, his decision to stay over and teach the Uday Shankar style of dance to the dancers of the theatre group turned out to be an enriching and unique experience for all of them. In the initial phase of his permanence was Kelucharan, who took the maximum advantage from Dayal's teachings and put immediately into action the newly acquired experience in the compositions of the dance items for the subsequent play Aloka, for which he composed a dance piece in three different styles, Manipuri, Odissi and Kathak. For the following play Nara Devata, he composed a group dance and for the Upendra Bhanja nataka he composed an abhinaya to the famous song 'Kanto bina diba rajani sajani' ('without my husband days and nights appear very long') combining both the mahari and gotipua styles.
In the words of Kelucharan: "Dayal Sharana showed me the way; he made me conscious of what my body was doing and what more could be achieved through exercises. He made me aware of the use of the different mudras of the hands and of the possibilities of utilizing the same hand gestures for expressing different actions. He taught me how to compose small sequences of dance by putting together different steps; he opened in front of me the door of creativity and once I went beyond its threshold I never had to look back."
After Kelucharan and Pankaj departed from the B group, the dance items composed by them continued to be performed by the dancers of the group either independently or as part of the plays. In the early fifties, the other two future stalwarts of the Odissi dance revival joined the group, Mayadhar Raut and Deba Prasad Das, and both of them got enriched by the teachings of Dayal Sharana, who kept on visiting the theatre at intermittent intervals from his native place in Andhra Pradesh. The time was now mature for the dance scene to acquire its independent identity, to emerge from all the different streams by which it had been nurtured and to assume a unique and distinctive place of its own.
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