JOIN USA symbol of poise and elegance, Alekhya Punjala’s odyssey with dance began at the tender age of four. Today, an accomplished Bharatanatyam and Kuchipudi dancer, she has many accolades to her credit, writes Aruna Chandaraju.
Alekhya Punjala was barely four and enrolled in a Montessori school in Hyderabad when she began clamouring to learn classical dance. So, her mother took her to the school dance teacher Dayal Sharan asking that she be enrolled in his dance class. Sharan was an accomplished artiste who had mentored Kelucharan Mohapatra and been part of the legendary Uday Shankar’s dance troupe.
However, Sharan was annoyed because he could not believe a child so young could be serious about classical art. “I come here to teach dance, not babysit,” he said dismissively. But the mother persisted. He finally relented. Soon, Sharan was counting Alekhya among his most promising students.
Today, Alekhya is respected as an accomplished Bharatanatyam and Kuchipudi dancer whose creative choreography and sathvika abhinaya are commended by critics and connoisseurs. She has over four decades of performing experience behind her, is an ‘Outstanding Artiste’ with the ICCR panel, and a top ranking artiste of Doordarshan. She has received the Sangeet Natak Akademi Puraskar for Kuchipudi dance (2011); Hamsa Award from the Andhra Pradesh Government for excellence in dance; Prathibha Rajiv Puraskar; and Abhinaya Tapaswini from Sahitya Peetham, besides a long list of honours, titles and awards from private organisations. She runs her own dance school, Trishna.
Change in direction
However, to her first guru’s disappointment, she did not pursue Odissi and Kathak, the two forms in which he was proficient and wanted to groom her in. Alekhya soon veered to Bharatanatyam and Kuchipudi, which she studied under Uma Rama Rao. “At that age — I was about seven or eight years old — I think it was the bright and colourful costumes and jewellery, that is the aaharyam and narrative elements of the two dance forms, which attracted me,” she laughs. Later, of course, she grew to understand and admire the aesthetic wealth of these dance forms.
Alekhya gave her arangetram in both these dance forms when at 14. She also took to serious academic study of dance. She received a doctorate for her work on the great composer Kshetrayya’s padams. The 17th-century Telugu composer is considered the ‘king of padams’ and his compositions are a precious part of the repertoire of Carnatic music, Kuchipudi and Bharatanatyam.
She says, “People were surprised I took up Kshetrayya for doctoral research, since I had always been greatly interested in performing to Annamacharya keerthanas. However, I think at that age, I was beginning to understand the emotional content of Kshetrayya’s compositions and admire his insights into the myriad moods of a young woman.”
Even as a busy mother of two, she kept her career as a dancer going. Soon she became a faculty member at Potti Sreeramulu Telugu University, where she even headed the Department of Dance. “I teach, I practise and perform, and yet there seems to be so much more to do in these art forms. Bharatanatyam and Kuchipudi have fascinating dramatic and narrative elements, and offer endless scope for exploration and study.”
As a performer, however, for the last one and half decades or so, she has focused on Kuchipudi alone. “I admire both forms, but feel Kuchipudi offers much greater scope for abhinaya.”
She adds that when it comes to creativity in expression, in the hands of imaginative artistes, Indian classical dance offers enormous scope –– sky is the limit. She feels that intelligent and aesthetic abhinaya can communicate the most complex of emotions, and the most subtle of feelings, and to a wide range of viewers. “I have been able to reach out to vastly different audiences.” At a performance in Movva village, the birthplace of Kshetrayya, when Alekhya performed to the Kshetrayya padam ‘Rayabaaramampinaada Raanu Raananuma’, she presented the pallavi as articulated by three nayikas –– Sveeya, Parakeeya and Samanya. “It received tremendous response. Even when I have performed elaborate abhinaya or narrated very Indian stories rooted in our culture through dance in places like Bulgaria, Germany, USA and the Middle East, I have noticed that people understand and appreciate.”
Biggest strength
Sathvika Abhinaya is her forte and dominates many of her current performances. She explains the phrase thus: “Sathvika Abhinaya is when the innermost and dormant feelings and subtle emotions are brought out in such a way that even laymen can understand and identify with them.”
Like many senior dancers and musicians of today, Alekhya regrets that many youngsters are in a hurry to ascend the stage. And that their overambitious parents encourage their children in this regard. Also, there are many sincere students who stop pursing dance just when they are on the verge of developing into good artistes because of the pressures of demanding academic pursuits and the lack of lucrative job opportunities.
“We need to have many more good platforms for classical dance and both parents and students should realise the importance of patient, rigorous training,” she says.