ABSTRACT
After the tour of 1962, Uday Shankar disbanded the troupe once they returned to India in February 1963. Many of the erstwhile members of Shankar’s troupe now came together to form the Indian Ballet Troupe (IBT), which though primarily engaged with taking forward Shankar’s legacy, performed other styles as well. In 1965, together with Amala Shankar, Uday Shankar set up the “Uday Shankar India Culture Centre” in Kolkata. The institute was a reminiscence of the centre at Almora, though on a much smaller scale. It became a centre for learning not only for Uday Shankar’s style of creative dance but various classical styles of India as well. Shankar however was not happy. The creative artist in him soon became restless for new productions. Soon after, by the end of 1965 itself, he reached out to his erstwhile troupe members to band together, this time for the production of Prakriti – Ananda, based on Tagore’s dance drama Chandalika and poem by the name Prakriti – Ananda. The members of the IBT were taken on as dancers for the production as many were Shankar’s erstwhile troupe members, while the others were already trained in his style, given the repertoires of IBT. Shankar was also well acquainted with IBT’s work. This chapter explores Uday Shankar’s Prakriti Anando, as a window to one of the major social challenges ailing independent India – that of untouchability; together with a consideration of the context that may have influenced the maestro to choose this particular work of Tagore as a performance piece to interpret. It also explores the performative text itself, the choreography, as well as the actual performance and tours across India.
