The Journey of Purulia Chhau Dance. From Vague to Vogue

The journey of Purulia Chhau Dance: From Vague to Vogue

“Peculiarity of mask made the Chhau of Purulia colorful” (qtd. in Sing 62, my translation).

The comment, made by Padma Shri awardee Chhau artist Gambhir Sing Mura, may well define the individual identity of the Chhau of Purulia in comparison with the other folk cultures, as well as with Chhau dances of other regions. In spite of being a cultural identity of the marginalized people, Chhau, only because of its individuality and peculiarity, was patronized by the kings and landlords. With the transition of a period to a newer one, Chhau also tries to adjust itself in the newly defined territory by reciprocation of characteristics. This paper attempts to take a grip of that transition, a panoramic shot that will encircle Chhau from its inception to what it is now. Again, not only the dance but also the history of the term Chhau is itself a result of an evolution. The evolution of the dance, its instruments, the narrative style, the music, the mask and the livelihood of the artists are taken into consideration in the process of writing the paper. The transition of Chhau from dance to dance drama has also been brought to focus.

As a generalized topic, the term Chhau refers to a folk dance format, based on mythological stories and is usually performed by the tribal people of eastern India, namely some specific areas of West Bengal, Jharkhand and Odisha. Based on these three geographic locations, Chhau represents itself in three different genres; the Purulia Chhau of West Bengal, the Seraikella Chhau of Jharkhand and the Mayurbhanj Chhau of Odisha. The dancers are mostly male and common day laborers, and usually belong to the Kurmi and Bhumij tribes. The Chhau of Mayubhanj differs from the Chhau of Purulia and of Seraikella on the ground of the former‟s avoidance of masks. The Chhau of Purulia mostly centers on the common Hindu rituals. Usually it starts from Chaitra Parva, a common Hindu festival of the „month of full moon‟ (Cardinale 27) and ends with Rohan, a ritual for sowing the seeds (Bhattacharya 3: 190).

The excavation on the etymological history of Chhau breeds a lot of controversies among the people. The mostly cited logic on the arrival of the term is the repeated utterance of the word Choo, especially by the musicians of Purulia Chhau parties during a performance, known as pala. Again the term is often uttered as Chhou or Choo or even as Cha by the people of Purulia and thus the term creates a proximity with the Bengali term of „six‟ (Sen 5). Interestingly Chhau dance is a mosaic of six different acrobatic movements encapsulated in a popular folk rhyme as uttered by the popular Chhau artist Mr Bhagaban Das Kumar: “Ghura, ulfa, digbaji/ Chal, Chakar/rangbaji” (qtd in Karmakar 42).

Sitakant Mahapatra believes that the term Chhau derives its name from military camps “known in Oriya and Bengali as Chhauni” (50). During the peacetime, the warriors of the Hindu kings of Middle Ages practiced their military skills and martial arts as a preparation for uninvited combats as well as a form of entertainment within their Chhaunis. Prof. Ashutosh Bhattacharya prefers to use the term Choo instead of Chhau, believing it to be derived from sanga, which actually refers to a harlequin (3: 767). Apart from that, in Kurmali and Odia languages the term chhua refers to a male child (Satpathi 33). The term therefore may have a slight connection with Chhau as in its childhood period the performers were all male. Mohan Khokar stirs another etymological root of the phrase. To him, Chhau may have originated through the Sanskrit root chhaya, or shade (186). The masks, metaphorically as well as literally becomes the shade to conceal the identity of the Chhau artists The view of Guru Kedar Nath Sahoo, one of the leading exponents of the Seraikella tradition of Chhau dance fosters another etymological meaning of the term. According to him, Chhau is a distorted form of chadam, which refers to the dresses worn by the performers (qtd. in Mahato 51). However, Gambhir Sing Mura negated all those excavations upon the etymological meaning of Chhau and preferred to recline upon six acrobatic dance movements to be the origin of Chhau: “We can never accept this definition of Chhau. Chhau must have laf, jhap, kap, ura, ulfa, digbaji” (qtd. in Paramanik 69, my translation). In 2010 Chhau dance was marked in the UNESCO‟s Representative list of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity (unesco.org). From then Chhau gains its wide circulation as opposed to chhou or choo or cha.

The origin of Chhau dance draws us to pharikhanda style of dance, as opined by Kiriti Mahato, suggesting phari as the shield and khanda as the sword (pers. Comm., 10 May 2017). The Chhau dance of Purulia is usually based on veera or courage among the navarasas or nine emotions of Indian classical dances. To researcher Malay Choudhury, Chhau is a perfect amalgamation of „Human life movement‟ and „wild life movement‟ (20). Pashupati Prasad Mahato also contributes to analyze the history and origin of Chhau dance. He states: If we study the very stances and gaits of the dance we find that six local dance forms had been incorporated in Choo dance namely Natua/Firkel/Fari Khanda dance, a martial art of the region; Nachni, the dance form of Lasya or erotic; Kirtan or Vaisnav‟s mass prayer songs and dance; Majhi Nach or the dance of the Santals or Mundas or Hos of Jharkhand, which is a collective dance form of the male and the females; Danr Nach or Kathi Nach of the Kudmi, Deswali, Gour or other indigenous people; and Karam dance a ritual dance of all the indigenous people of the entire Hor/Ho/Horo-Mitan people of Jharkhand. (59) To observe its history, as Kishore points out, we must trace back to 10th century when Gopal Pal, a local Hindu king attacked the tribes of Manbhum which is presently an area shared between the states of Jharkhand, West Bengal and Odisha (242). This invasion led to a hybridization of tribal dance cultures and bred Paika dance which was done by the Pikas or the warriors of a king. The dance goes to a further transformation with the entrance of storytelling and was popularized as Natua dance. In order to appease the Hindu kings, the performers started adapting the Hindu mythological stories and performed with the help of wooden masks to differentiate gods with demons. And for the sensual elements of Lasya or eroticism, Chhau is grateful to Nachni Dance, though it is a much later addition. The present form of Chhau is nothing but a further transformation of these tribal dances. Obsoleted palas like Bhaluk Chhau (Chhau of bear) and Kada Chhau (Chhau of Buffalo), which were made imitating the movements of those animals, may denote its origin from hunting. Different existing palas also hail to the said origin. Kirat-Arjun pala of the Chhau of Purulia, Sarpa Nritya or the Snake Dance pala of the Chhau of Seraikella and Kalchakra or the Wheel of Time pala of the Chhau of Mayurbhanj are still based on the classical form of hunting (Mahato 76).

Due to Purulia‟s past history it is often supposed that Chhau dance is a form inherited from the states of Bihar, Jharkhand and Odisha. It is also thought that Chhau is a term derived from chhat, a ritual of the people of Bihar. Prof. Ashutosh Bhattacharya absolutely negates all these assumptions and says:

Those who are even slightly aware of the traditions of Purulia can never accept the fact that Chhau dance was originated and developed in Seraikella. The episodes of The Ramayana, which are represented in Chhau, are not of Valmiki, but of Krittibasa. The performances are even based on the elders‟ stories, mostly out of the real Ramayana or Mahabharata. The battle between Shiva and Rama, which is a recurrent theme in Chhau, can be cited here. In the Middle Ages, a lot of stories were written on this topic and Shankar Kabichandra, a poet from Bankura was one among those writers. However, it is written neither in Krittibas nor in Valmiki. Hence, the tradition of Chhau dance must be from Bengal, not from other areas. (Bhattacharya 3: 191, my translation)

Bhagaban Das Kumar, a famous Chhau artist of Purulia unveils another history on the development of Purulia Chhau which goes in a complete contrast with the view fostered by Bhattacharya. To him, Chhau was imported from Seraikella. He referred to a person named Banamali Goswami who learnt this Chhau dance from the Raj palace of Seraikella because in the earlier periods only Seraikella possessed Chhau parties. He adapted this dance form and performed Chhau dance in Purulia for the first time. At that time Chhau was a solo dance, done by one single artist. It is told that Jipa Sing, the father of Chhau artist Gambhir Sing Mura, learnt his dance forms under the supervision of Banamali Goswami (qtd. in Karmakar 43). It is true that in its childhood period Chhau was devoid of any influence of religion. Professor Roma Chatterji talks of the migration histories of the Chhau mask makers (Sahapedia online). The kings of Baghmundi, Brajagopal Sing Deo and his son Madanmohan Sing Deo brought eighteen Sutradhar families from Bardhaman and gave them lands to dwell as well as to cultivate. To repay the king these mask makers inclined to create masks of the gods and goddesses of Hindu religion. Before the arrival of masks, the dancers, in order to create a distinction with the audience “used to paint their faces in black color, and danced throughout night on the beats of dhol” (Dey 5). At a later period, dried gourd was used as mask by painting portraits of human figures onto it. The usage of wooden mask was also arrived at a later period. Even in 1970s, there were examples of villages where masks were not in vogue in Chhau. Moreover, the arrival of female masks connotes the termination of the role of female characters in some earlier period under the realm of some Hindu kings. Dr Bhattacharya claims that Chhau, at its origin was much more interesting: “The Chhau dance must have been much more realistic and powerful then, because the women, at that time made it more lively by their active participation on this dance” (3: 196, my translation). He further comments that „the decaying era‟ of folk dance marks the inception of mask era (3: 768). With the absorption of the rights of women in dance, masks of female figures started compensating the gap. Moreover, the superstitions let the villagers keep their moustaches and beards and thus acted as obstacles to act in the role of women. Mask then came as a tonic to save the masculinity, as well as to keep on the femininity in Chhau dance. Another disturbing explanation given by Dr Bhattacharya on the arrival of masks is that the people of Purulia are comparatively black in color and for presenting the role of sophisticated gods they had to conceal their ugly figures (3: 771, my translation, my emphasis).

There is no specified as well as no valid document that can set a panoramic shot on the grassroots of Chhau of Purulia. It is believed that Chhau, with its origin or derivation in Purulia streams in four different parts, known as gharanas. Though in the apparent point view, every Gharana emits same features but in fact they differ. Purulia Chhau was first brought to the fore from the Baghmundi region and hence this gharana is taken to be the oldest of all. The area is mostly occupied by the tribal people and its distinctive feature is the ultra-usage of acrobatic movements.

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