When gods go to school, a dance-drama on Friday

‘Swargada Shaale’ aims to address the lack of content for young children in the world of classical dance

What did the childhood of goddesses Saraswati, Lakshmi and Parvathy and their male counterparts Vishnu and Shiva look like? A new Bharatanatyam production featuring 78 children seeks to answer this question. It will be staged on Friday.
The dance-drama is set in Swargada Shaale, a fictitious school attended by eight-year-old Saraswati, Lakshmi, Parvathy, Vishnu and Shiva. It is not a normal school. Consider it the Hogwarts for Hindu deities, set somewhere in the heavens. Children come here to hone their divine powers and become dutiful gods and goddesses. In labs, they create the human race and iterate them until they are perfect. They chose their vahanas (vehicles). They go through lessons on history and good versus evil.

Swargada Shaale, also the name of the production, is an attempt to address the lack of content for young children in the world of classical dance. “Often in Bharatanatyam, children are supposed to act like adults on stage. I used to find that odd,” choreographer and dance teacher Matangi Prasan shares why she decided to spin a children-centric story.

“Children, if gods were your age, what would they do? What would they look like?”— Matangi took this question to the students of her Bharatanatyam school Matangi Nrithyakshetra in Maruthi Nagar. Aged between 5 and 15, the children found it tough to ideate, she says. “We are so conditioned to think of gods (in a certain way). But slowly, they came up with suggestions like ‘Lakshmi and Shiva climb a tree and then they are seen fighting over a fruit’,” she shares.

Discussions continued and soon, characters developed, representing a cross-section of children one can find in ‘human schools’. Saraswati is timid but a total nerd. Vishnu is a prankster. Parvathy is a rule-breaker. Shiva is an introvert. The goddess of material wealth, Lakshmi loves dressing up. She is also good at math but her teachers feel she talks a bit too much. Gods like Indra, Varuna and Hanuman make cameos throughout their school life.

Arjun Bharadwaj has written the songs for the show in Kannada and Ila Sangeetha Diliip has composed the music. “But the songs and taalams have been sung and recorded by children,” says Matangi. Her students had a blast putting the show together. “It is close to their age and their life. They loved running around on the stage as they do at school,” she adds.

On December 22, 6 pm, at ADA Rangamandira, J C Road. Tickets online