Kumudini Lakhia
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A life in Kathak
The Times of India Dec 22 2015
Malini Nair
From doing away with the dupatta to introducing secular themes on stage, the grande dame of contemporary kathak, Kumudini Lakhia, has been redefining the dance form for 50 years
Nothing riles the indomitable Kumudiwni Lakhia as much as the idea of unquestioning reverence. She is 85 but a big ger rebel than dancers half her age. At Kadamb, her dance school in Ahmedabad which turned 50 this year, she refuses to let students sit at her feet. “Sit up here, next to me, respect your spine,“ she commands. And as for gurudom, she is emphatic: “I tell my students khabardar, don't go up on stage and call me guru, take responsibility for what you are doing.“
In the once cloistered world of kathak, there are few rules Kumiben, as she is fondly called, hasn't defied. From movements and mudras to body language and aesthetics of presentation, the changes she brought were sweeping. She gave kathak definition, dignity , methodology and most importantly , room to change and grow.
Lakhia's dance philosophy inspired a wide spectrum of avant garde kathak and contemporary dancers in India and abroad today -Aditi Mangaldas, Prashant Shah, Daksha Sheth, Akram Khan, Aakash Odedra, Sanjukta Sinha and Vaishali Trivedi among them. They are all dancers who are constantly pushing boundaries as they stay moored to kathak. At Kadamb's celebrations in Ahmedabad, there were over 20 alumni dancers from across the world, from Japan to Canada.
Kumiben says her relearning started after her famous dance collaborations with legendary dancer Ram Gopal in the late 1940s. “I would do what my guru told me till 17, then I started touring the world with him. I saw ballet in Spain, the USSR, Britain, US and I saw the planning that went into dance -the costuming, stage design, lights. I saw how beautiful dance can look when there is discipline in the lines of the body ,“ recalls Kumiben.
Those were years when kathak was stuck in time. Stagecraft and aesthetics were missing from performances, costumes and jewellery were tacky , and as for the themes, they were limited mostly to Radha-Krishna sagas. What Kumiben did was to take the casualness out of kathak -lighting became subtle, costumes ac quired elegance and form. She insisted on a straight spine (you can tell the Kadamb school by the confident, erect stance of the dancer), clear lines and intelligence in dance.More radically, she choreographed modern, secular poetry, abandoning mythology .
Renowned bharatanatyam master CV Chandrashekhar still remembers her choreography of The Coat, based on Khuntiyon Par Tange Log by poet Sarveshwar Dayal Saxena, in Vadodara. “I was stunned by her courage in bringing a contemporary theme to stage, it gave me great strength to explore alternate themes in bharatanatyam,“ he says.
One of her most path-breaking works was Duvidha, a solo performed in 1971 about a woman caught between household drudgery and her ambition to fly high. It was way ahead of its times. The dancer wore a plain sari with a thin border tucked in at the waist, no jewellery except ear rings, no stagey makeup, just kajal lining the eye. The music by Atul Desai was elec tronic. It shocked the purists, and got as much flak as applause. “I said let us give the gods a break from kathak. Why not have a middle class, middle aged housewife on stage weary of washing, cooking and cleaning dreaming of becoming that powerful woman Prime Minister she reads about? Why should the heroine always be the Natya Shastra ideal -young, willowy , curvaceous?“ asks the irrepressible Lakhia.
The acerbic Statesman critic Subbudu described Duvidha as “ridicu lous“. The review gave her sleepless nights, she admits, but points out in gleeful triumph with a chuckle: “But I made him sit up, right? I said I will do this a hundred times till I educate Subuddu. And I did, after 25 years he called me a pioneer.“
She went on to create many more contemporary kathak pieces such as Prem Chakshu, Yugal, Shakti and Atah Kim? and Dhabkar. She never stopped experimenting, using African, jazz, rock, folk and dhrupad music for her dances. “I hate archaic classicism. I asked my students to abandon unnecessary ornamentation -no bangles, elaborate chains, hair jewels hat always get caught in the dupatta,“ she says miming the hapless dancer dealing with costume malfunction on stage.
Most famously she asked her dancers o abandon the billowing yards of dupatta.When Dhabkar, based on the beating pulse, came to Delhi the outrage over this was huge. “They called us `besharam' for not covering up the chest. I say you take 15 years to train your body , then come up on he stage and cover the torso, where the movements show so beautifully , with yards of cloth. Let the dance cover your body not billowing cloth,“ she says.
A lot of trends she started are now a part of accepted kathak idiom. The chakkars pirouettes where the body revolves at a spot but also in a large circle around he stage, the erect bearing, the abstract hemes, the dramatic bol pattens, even the demanding levels of fitness that are so de rigeur now.
“She transformed the way we used space, redefined movement and its trans erence so that even a small dancer can fill he stage. Most importantly , she taught us to be independent minded and adventur ous,“ says dancer Aditi Mangaldas.
Age hasn't withered the danc er's enthusiasm. As her grand son jokes, she often declares her future plans at the din ing table with the prefix “When I grow old...“
