THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Geetha starts with slow, swaying movements, gradually building a steady crescendo. In between she lifts her gold-fringed odhini and spins, easily conjuring a swirl of black-and-glitter. She keeps gyrating till the strains of ‘holiya mein ude re gulal’ comes to an abrupt end.
“Our dance is the synchronicity of ‘bol’ and ‘naach’,” says the Rajasthani dancer, who is in the city to perform kalbelia, a folk dance form celebrating the nomadic heritage.
For the dancers, kalbelia is part of their cultural and communal identity, a lifestyle that dates back to centuries. “It’s the dance of the kalbelia community, people from other castes don’t do it.
Even if we try to teach others they can’t do it that well. Since we have been doing this for so many generations, the style is ingrained in our genes. We put our heart and soul to it, others don’t do that,” says Neelam, another dancer.
A tribe of snake-charmers in the past, they usually perform in groups comprising of male singers and female dancers. “We take care of the music part by playing instruments and singing,” adds Kamalnath, Geetha’s husband and another member of the band.
In rural Rajasthan, no festival is complete without the exuberant kalbelia. “We have dances for all occasions. The Holi season has already begun and the song you just heard is meant for the festival of colours. If you go to any village in Rajasthan now, you will hear this song. We love vibrant colours and there is some reason why we are called ‘rangeelo Rajasthan’,” adds Kamalnath.
Neelam says she was a dancer as long as she can remember, “nobody taught us to dance, it’s in our blood. When you hear the music you just know how to move.”
Geetha is decked in a black sequined dress with blue and yellow panels and she says its the traditional costume for kalbelia. Now, Neelam points to her spectacular pink lehenga and says it’s for ghoomar, another folk dance. “We have a lot of dances in the desert. But for kalbelia you wear only black, it’s a very special kind of dance,” she adds.
They agree kalbelia was made popular by Bollywood starlets with everyone from Sridevi to Deepika Padukone shaking a leg to the folk tunes.
“But if you think nimbuda nimbuda and mast kalandar are film songs, you are wrong. These are all songs of our ancestors,” says Talib Khan, another member of the group. The artists will be presenting kalbelia as part of the National Folk Festival on February 25 at Nishagandhi.