In the past few years craze for ‘dandiya nights’ has increased among the denizens of the State capital. Several hotels, clubs and other organisations are holding special dandiya events for the people.
Dandiya, earlier performed only by the Gujarati community members of the city, has now griped the attention of several people belonging to different communities in the city too. Almost every year several clubs and hotels in the city play host to dandiya night celebrations.
Talking about the dandiya event organised at Hotel BNR Chanakya, Amit Kumar said, “Every year we provide space to various organisation to conduct dandiya night, we as the hospitality partner only make proper arrangement for the denizens. Moreover, the response towards dandiya night has increased among the common masses especially among the non-Guajarati. One can witness huge crowd inside the hotel premises during the Navratra time.”
However, few Guajarati community members every year organize dandiya in their traditional style. Citing details about the event, Secretary of Guajarati Patel Samaj, Ramji Patel said, “We are organizing dandiya event in traditional style since past twenty years in the city. People of all age groups participate in the event. We play Garba and every ritual is performed in the traditional way. From day one of Navratra, all people play dandiya.”
Stating about dandiya craze among the Non-Guajarati’s’, Patel further asserted, Earlier, we used to organise dandiya nights just for the Gujarati society but as more people from various communities were interested in participating in dandiya during Navratra, we opened the community centre for all. The influence of television and metropolitan culture are main reasons behind such an inclination among non Guajarati’s.”
Several dance academies conducts workshop for teaching dancing lessons especially for the dandiya nights. Mahima Prasad, a resident of Harmu said, “Dandiya is organised in our colony. To ensure that our group performs well, we take professional training from the dance academy to learn atleast basic steps. This year too we have attended two weeks workshop before the Durga puja.”
Durga puja is also a time to mingle with people, come across new friends and indulge in traditional activities to gain knowledge about various cultures.
“I have already bought a traditional Gujarati style lehenga to wear for the dandiya night. I want to look my best as I will definitely be meeting many new people. This is the time to know about other community culture and tradition,” asserted Vatshala Tripathi, a college student.