Bharti Dang didn’t present Kabir as a character in her choreography. He came across as an entity ‘whom you’ve to seek inside’. The danseuse spoke to Utpal K Banerjee
In the turbulent annals of this land, there have been successive periods of political anarchy, social upheavals and stranglehold of rigid orthodoxy by the established religion. Surprisingly, whenever the voice of protestation arose, it came mostly from the lowest rungs of the society and pleaded forcefully to restore harmony everywhere. And the extraordinary thing was that the two greatest of the souls were born as marginalised weavers in caste. In the first-millennium south India appeared the poet Thiruvvaluvar, hailing from a weaver family of Thanjavoor, who wrote his magnum opus, Thirukkural. This was an exquisite work of 1,330 verses (comprising couplets and quartets) on the ethics and dharma to be followed by both family-men and saints. In its three-part instructions, the last part did not exclude pleasures of life.
Kabir, who emerged in the second-millennium north India, was also from a weaver class of Varanasi, and perhaps the greatest of devotional poets of all time. He, too, composed, mostly impromptu, poetry in dohas and chaupais — since collected in Bijak, Sakhi Granth, Anurag Sagar and Kabir Granthavali — recognised as either nirguna (sans any divinity) or saguna (invoking divinity). While nirguna verses were prem-margi (seeking love) or jnan-margi (seeking knowledge), saguna verses branched into Rama-bhakti (devotion to Rama) or Krishna-bhakti (devotion to Krishna): both streams adding rich poetic legacy to literature and intimate moral dictates to society.
Kabir, produced recently by Subha Dance Company at IHC, was about remembering the saint. With concept and choreography by the young Kathak danseuse Bharti Dang, it was a chiaroscuro: culled form various anecdotes of Kabir’s known life. This was interspersed with a sparkling narrative that dilated up on his philosophy in straightforward language. The beauty of the succinct presentation was that Kabir never appeared on stage; he remained, in keeping with his nirguna, jnan-margi dohas used — formless, without attributes. The four female and two male dancers were again in consonance with the choreographer’s Jaipur gharana, technically oriented with more of tatkars (footworks) and chakradhars (pirouettes) and less of abhinaya (expression). For a change, the abstract dancing suited the spirit of the performance, since the saint remained elusive, not to be seen throughout. The concluding scene, where the devotees furiously debated between the rituals of cremation or burial for Kabir’s last remains and discovered, alongside his immortal doha: Jhini chadariya…, only fragrant flowers under the covering cloth, to be taken for the final rites — brought out, all at once, the essential dignity and serenity of the theme. It reminded one of the utter futility of quarrels over faiths that still go on in our land. Excerpts of an interview with the choreographer:
Why did you choose Kabir as the themeIJ
Since my early years of learning Kathak, I realised that the dance form had undergone many changes in the Mughal and Muslim periods on its entertainment value but in the temple period, sampradays (groups) used to dance and tell stories. Kabir was then an endemic subject with his dohas. I wanted to revive the idea.
Why did you eliminate Kabir from appearing on stageIJ
I wanted to represent Kabir with the spark of light, not clothed in elaborate costume on stage. To me, he was not a character in a story, but like his Sai (God), an entity deep within, whom you’ve to seek inside. My dancers didn’t need his physical presence on stage.
Your finale was particularly poignant…
I used the illumined, white sheet to indicate the presence of the saint’s body, with his celebrated song of the transparent cloth that he creates. As a weaver, this was the most telling metaphor he could use that I’ve ever come across.
How do you relate to Kabir todayIJ
His sayings on human mind and morale are still relevant. There are a large number Kabir Maths and Kabirpanthis who follow his tenets — considering him as God’s incarnation. Somewhere, he must have touched people’s heart: to remain so vitally alive even now.