Indian Classical Dance, Commodified

A typical Kuchipudi costume and pose (ft. yours truly).

Growing up in an Indian Hindu household, I visited many temples in my hometown during festival season. Diwali, Dussehra, Sankranti, Navaratri – on each occasion, my parents, my brother, and I would take a trip to local temples to pray for good health and success. At the time, I didn’t recognize the meaning behind many of these festivals; my main goal was to coax extra prasad (food that is offered to the gods and then distributed to temple-goers) from the priests by leveraging my young age.

But what truly held my interest during these visits were the performances put on by local Indian classical dance schools. I was starstruck by the confidence of the dancers as they carried themselves with a kind of elevated grace I immediately wanted to emulate. My parents noticed my interest, staying for hours on end just to let me watch to my heart’s content.

There are many different forms of Indian classical dance, such as Bharatnatyam, Kuchipudi, Odissi, and Kathakali. Each originates from a different part of India, and has a unique form and technique that distinguishes it from the others. Kuchipudi and Bharatnatyam in particular are often considered quite “similar” compared to the others, as they have similar stances and hastas (hand positions). Kuchipudi, however, tends to have more fluid motions and focuses more on abhinaya (facial expressions), while Bharatnatyam is stiffer and has much more grounded technique. As a 7-year-old, I chose to pursue Kuchipudi.

Over the 11 years I’ve spent dancing this art form, I’ve performed in countless venues, from dingy near-empty parking lots to large auditoriums with distinguished guests. But the performance I’ve held most dear to my heart is my Rangapravesam. 

Translated to English, Rangapravesam (similar to Bharatnatyam’s Arangetram) means “ascending the stage,” and signals a dancer’s solo debut. In practice, it’s a 3-hour long performance, in which the dancer performs several pieces of solo dance repertoire, usually accompanied by a live orchestra (including a singer, a violinist, a flautist, a mridangam player, and a taal player). In a more abstract sense, it acts as a landmark achievement in one’s dance career – a signal that you now have the foundational strength to perform as a solo act and even teach students to some extent. It helps a dancer recognize how far they’ve come, and how much more they can grow.

But for so many classical Indian dance schools in the Bay Area, these performances have been commodified. Teachers turn their schools into Arangetram “factories,” churning out hundreds of these performances over the course of a couple years to better market their business. 

Granted, I never had to experience going through an Arangetram or Rangapravesam factory myself. When I was in high school, my dance school put out only one or two Rangapravesams per year, if any. Most of the dancers were in their junior or senior year of high school by the time they were given approval to start training for the performance. I personally performed my Rangapravesam at the age of 15, which, at the time, was the youngest of anyone in my dance school. That said, when I looked back at my performance, it was far from perfect – in fact, when I first saw the recording of it, I was furious I hadn’t held my arms tighter or sat in aramandi more. Over time, however, I realized that while it was not my best performance, I’d grown immensely as a dancer through my training. I also gained much more self-confidence by repeatedly pushing myself past my limits.

Many dance schools, however, overlook the value of this growth and training. Oftentimes, teachers agree to put unprepared students on stage in exchange for some kind of fee. Of course, students should pay their dance teachers for their lessons, but these teachers should better recognize when a dancer is prepared to take on a challenge like a Rangapravesam/Arangetram. Allowing students to take the stage when they’re not ready only diminishes the value of this performance and the art form as a whole.

I’ve seen this most frequently in younger dancers, especially those around 8 or 9 years old. This is not to say young dancers shouldn’t do their Rangapravesams or Arangetrams. Naturally, there are some incredibly talented young performers who are capable of successfully executing this performance and could grow immensely by going through this training. But most dancers just aren’t ready at such a young age, especially since many of them have only just begun dancing. Usually, it takes years of building foundations and at least one additional year of intense training to execute an Arangetram properly. When you’re that young, you simply haven’t existed long enough to get that kind of experience.

Yet too many teachers agree to put these dancers on stage despite knowing they aren’t yet able to express some of the finer aspects of the art form – and it shows in the performance. Objectively, it’s an impressive feat of athleticism and confidence for a dancer of any age to perform solo for 3 hours (not to mention the sweaty dress changes in between pieces). Yet the nuances of the dance are often forgotten due to lack of stamina or maturity. And in a dance form rooted in telling stories about Indian mythology, that’s a critical loss.

One of the three dresses I changed into for my Rangapravesam

Take, for example, one of the mandatory pieces in Kuchipudi Rangapravesam repertoire – the Javali. A Javali is a light and playful piece, oftentimes backed by an erotic storyline. Typically, the story follows a young woman attempting to entice a man (usually a divine being) while keeping it a secret from others in the village (sometimes even cheating on her husband to achieve this end). There’s an element of seduction, flirtiness, but at the same time, spirituality – in a literary sense, this woman breaks social boundaries to get closer to God. 

Even for accomplished dancers, this is a difficult balance to strike, and more so for younger dancers with less experience in these mature topics. Combine a lack of understanding with poor execution, and you have a performance that’s pretty underwhelming. 

In many of these cases, it’s not the dancer who pushes to finish their Arangetram (although I’ve seen incidences of that as well). Too often, it’s parents who want to finish the performance early so they can add it to their child’s resume or future college applications, or simply to brag to other dance parents. On the flip side, many teachers accept taking on these dancers because it allows them to market their school as one that can put out many Arangetrams in one year. While it is impressive for a school to smoothly organize such a large event repeatedly and consistently, the quality of the performances should hold precedence over the quantity. 

It’s important to remember that a Rangapravesam is a debut – it’s not an end in itself, but a means of growing as an artist. By exploiting the art form in this way, dancers are robbed of their potential to become the best artists they can possibly be. In the process, many of them lose their love for a dance form rich in story-telling and beauty. Dance serves as a way for people to break their boundaries and embrace their vulnerabilities, and we should not lose sight of these goals in a narrow-minded pursuit of “success.”