Report ; Insha Zarine Sayeed & Kanhu Charana Gouda
Bhubaneswar, June 27: Audience delighted to see ‘Bharat Leela’, the very famous rural folk poetic dance drama, which was highly popular among the rural people of Orissa, because it has all the ingredient of entertainment like drama, music, mythological and literary values.
Intellectuals, artistes, writers present in the evening appreciated the effort taken by Bhartiya Vidya Bhawan in collaboration with the Infosys Foundation for organizing the almost extinct folk dance cultural festival ‘Bharat Leela’ here on last week of this month.
Ex-Secretary of Odisha Sangeet Natak Academy and Chakadola Samman winner Shri Manmath Kumar Satpathy is the person behind making this event possible and successful to a large extent.
He informed to Report Odisha that though the state is known for its Culture and values but in the recent years the mark of it has somewhere been disappeared. Due to the fast moving life, people have left behind the values and their culture far off. Manmath Satpathy added saying, “Odisha is a house of around 100 folk dance forms which is still a secret to many Odias, which he tends to bring out in front of the people. The oldest Folk Dance form, Lankamodi Yatra (musk theatre) is considered as one of the rare art form where the artists wear a wooden mask weighing 90kgs which requires recognition is one of my aims”.
Lastly he said that Odisha is the only hub in the entire country which possesses all the four types of Puppet dance forms, String Puppet show, Shadow Puppet show, Gloves Puppet show and Stick Puppet show out of which String Puppet show was the eye-catcher of the Bharat Leela event.
The event topic held last Monday was presented by ‘Maa Devi Natya Kala Sansad’ residents of Mahanala village of Patapur, Ganjam and its execution (planning and direction) was given by Guru ‘Sriyukta Santosh Kumar Padhi’, the Odisha Sangeet Natak Academy Award winner. It has been decided by the authorities that every first and third Monday of every month will be dedicated to Odisha Folk. It must be wondered that Bhartiya Vidya Bhawan being a management institute why did it initiate to become a platform for culture, it is because they need to lift the dying Folk Culture to a national level and mark its revival.
Bharat Leela is the index of the many folkdance, Art, Culture being in vogue in Odisha nowadays. On deeply paying attention to the art it can be found that the acting of the main character “Dwari” is the manifestation of various folk dances being performed in Ganjam like Danda Naach, Pralhad Natak, Ghuduki Nata, Ramleela, Krishan Leela etc. This auspicious event is mostly conducted on an open stage with duration of 1 and a half hour only.
This Leela is made by four characters – Arjun, Satyabhama, Subhadra and Dwari. This play is filled with dance, song and dialogues and based on Subhadra Haran Story of “Sarala Mahabharat”. The writer of this play is Dinabandhu Das of Kalyani Singh Pur near Chhatrapur. The researchers have not yet reached at a conclusion regarding the creation of “Bharat Leela”.
It is learnt that in 4th decade of the 19th century, Dinabandhu Das while residing at Hooghly of West Bengal had written this and staged it as “Subhadra Harana Suanga”. Post this it’s been staged by various names as Hooghly Bharat, Subhadra Pasihaya, Duari Nata and lastly as Bharat Leela.
Afterwards, many eminent artists have joined and given new dimension to this performing art, and so is the reason it has now become a popular Folk Dance in Ganjam district of Odisha.
