Dance & drama fest by Abhinaya enthralls audience

Tirupati: Abhinaya Arts has been conducting its 18th dance and drama festival here for Hanuma awards. It has a track record of organising 172 dance performances and 32 dramas in 9 days. The theatre group has another distinction of organising the event in February every year for the last 18 years. The selection of dramas and skits was itself a major task for the organisers.

Highlights:

• A festival for theatre art lovers at Mahati Auditorium
• Out of 300 entries,32 find place in the event
• The 9-day festival will conclude today
• Organisers look for more support from govt

After receiving the applications from various parts of the country they go to their places and see the performance before giving the approval. This year, they have received 300 applications and 32 of them were selected. However, they allowed all dance performances without filtering any entry based on certain guidelines.

The event started on February 17 and ends on 25. The programmes were designed in a systematic way in which traditional and folk dances were allotted in morning slot with the evening slot earmarked for song skits and night time for social and mythological dramas.

This facilitates the audience to visit Mahati Auditorium during concerned time slot in which they were interested. Artistes from the two Telugu States, Kharagpur in West Bengal and Karnataka have come to Tirupati to participate in the festival under Abhinaya Arts banner. A traditional dance troupe from Hyderabad comprising of seven children danced beautifully with a concept of welcoming Lord Krishna to Madhura Nagari.

The little Krishna and the six Gopikas made audience spell bound with their cute performance of standing on decorated pots and holding the lighted candles on their heads initially.

Another group of youngsters from Sri Radhakrishna Music and Dance Kalakshethram of Dowaleswaram made the audience enthralled with their performances. They showed their talent to display the ‘Rama Paduka Pattabhishekam’ in which the entire Ramayana was presented in an adorable style.

Later, they performed for Annamacharya keerthana ‘Vadala vadala venta vasanthamu’ and disclosed the story river Godavari in a dance form. A dance troupe of Tapasya Natya Mandali from Karimnagar made a scintillating performance with the concept of Venkateswara Vaibhavam.

Various song skits, social, mythological plays and dramas include Chanchala, A Oori Chivari Gudise, Sundari-Subba Rao, Prajakavi Vemana, Droupadi Swayamvaram, Muriki Mandaralu, Kaliyuga Vaikuntham, Kotha Neeru and Kukka Pilla etc. All these were providing a visual feast for lovers of theatre art.

Speaking to The Hans India, the founder secretary of Abhinaya Arts BN Reddy said that though it became very difficult to organise such a mega event every year with the help of donors he could be able to continue it without a break. In the initial year, the expenditure was Rs 16,000 whereas now, it reached Rs 30 lakh.

Providing accommodation to almost 20 groups a day became a hectic task, he explained. “If government provides more support we can organise the event in a better way. My aim is to give a fresh life to the theatre art which was fading out gradually,” he maintained.