Chandralekha Prabhudas Patel (6 December 1928 – 30 December 2006), commonly known as Chandralekha, was a dancer and choreographer from

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

. The niece of

Vallabhbhai Patel Vallabhbhai Jhaverbhai Patel (; ''Vallabhbhāī Jhāverbhāī Paṭel''; 31 October 1875 – 15 December 1950), commonly known as Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, was an Indian independence activist and statesman who served as the first Deputy Prime ...

, India's first deputy Prime Minister, she was an exponent of performances fusing

Bharatanatyam ''Bharatanatyam'' is a Indian classical dance form that came from Tamil Nadu, India. It is a classical dance form recognized by the Sangeet Natak Akademi, and expresses South Indian religious themes and spiritual ideas of Hinduism and Jainism.< ...

with

Yoga Yoga (UK: , US: ; 'yoga' ; ) is a group of physical, mental, and spiritual practices or disciplines that originated with its own philosophy in ancient India, aimed at controlling body and mind to attain various salvation goals, as pra ...

and martial arts like

Kalarippayattu Kalaripayattu (), also known simply as Kalari, is an Indian martial art that originated on the southwestern coast of India, in what is now Kerala, during the 3rd century BCE. Etymology Kalaripayattu is a martial art which developed out of co ...

. She was conferred the highest award of the

Sangeet Natak Akademi Sangeet Natak Akademi (The National Academy of Music, Dance and Drama in English language, English) is the national level academy for performing arts set up by the Government of India. It is an autonomous body of the Ministry of Culture (India) ...

, India's National Academy for Music, Dance and Drama, the Sangeet Natak Akademi Fellowship in 2004.

Early life and education

She was born to an

agnostic Agnosticism is the view or belief that the existence of God, the divine, or the supernatural is either unknowable in principle or unknown in fact. (page 56 in 1967 edition) It can also mean an apathy towards such religious belief and refer to ...

doctor father and a devout

Hindu Hindus (; ; also known as Sanātanīs) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism, also known by its endonym Sanātana Dharma. Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pp. 35–37 Historically, the term has also be ...

mother in Vada,

Maharashtra Maharashtra () is a state in the western peninsular region of India occupying a substantial portion of the Deccan Plateau. It is bordered by the Arabian Sea to the west, the Indian states of Karnataka and Goa to the south, Telangana to th ...

. She spent her childhood in her native

Gujarat Gujarat () is a States of India, state along the Western India, western coast of India. Its coastline of about is the longest in the country, most of which lies on the Kathiawar peninsula. Gujarat is the List of states and union territories ...

and in Maharashtra.

Career

After completing high school, Chandralekha studied law, but quit her studies midway to learn dance instead. She started with Dasi Attam, a form of dance practiced by temple dancers in southern India, under the tutelage of Ellappa Pillai. She was also influenced by Balasaraswati and

Rukmini Devi Arundale Rukmini Devi Arundale (née Sastri; 29 February 1904 – 24 February 1986)Sharma, Shoba and Gangadean, Ashok (January 31, 2004 Naatya.org. Retrieved on 10 December 2018. was an Indian theosophist, dancer and choreographer of the Indian cl ...

in her dance education, but her choreography shows that she was more influenced by the former. Although Chandralekha received her early training in

, she went on to change her focus to postmodern fusion dances that incorporated elements from other dances, martial arts like

, and performing arts. Her essay 'Militant Origins of Indian Dance', originally published in ''Social Scientist'' in 1979, was later reprinted in the volume ''Improvised Futures: Encountering the Body in Performance'', part of the India Since the 90s series published by Tulika Books.

Awards and recognition

* 1991:

Sangeet Natak Akademi Award Sangeet Natak Akademi Award (IAST: Saṅgīta Nāṭaka Akādamī Puraskāra), also known as the Akademi Puraskar, is an award given by the Sangeet Natak Akademi, India's National Academy of Music, Dance & Drama. It is the highest Indian recogni ...

: Creative Dance * 2003-2004: Kalidas Samman * 2004: Sangeet Natak Akademi Fellowship

References

Bibliography

* Rustom Barucha. ''Chandralekha: Woman, Dance, Resistance.'' Indus. New Delhi: 1995.

External links

Archive film of Chandralekha performing Yanta in 1994 at Jacob's Pillow
Gujarati people Indian women choreographers Indian choreographers Recipients of the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award Recipients of the Sangeet Natak Akademi Fellowship 1928 births 2006 deaths Performers of Indian classical dance Indian female dancers Kalarippayattu practitioners Indian female martial artists Dancers from Maharashtra 20th-century Indian dancers 20th-century Indian women artists Women artists from Maharashtra {{India-dance-stub Experiments in Art and Technology collaborating artists