Sattriya Dance

Traditional art forms are subject to cycles of growth, decay, renewal and reconstruction, many a time. Indian Dance for centuries survived in the precincts of temples and courts that nurtured the art forms and contributed to its sustenance. However, it suffered a gradual decadence during the colonial period and it was only after the emergence of the Nationalist Movement that there was an upsurge of Indian dance. And the regeneration can undoubtedly be acclaimed as Dance Renaissance that followed during the Post Independence period. Situated in an extreme corner of the country Assam with its Sattriya art however escaped from such amelioration. The lamp lit in the 15th and the 16th centuries leavened through the ages and continue to lit with all its brightness even today. Thus with such a hoary past Sattriya Dance is one of the greatest living traditions of Indian art.

The Sattriya Dance, one of the finest forms of Indian dances, emerges from an offshoot of the Neo-Vaisnava movement in Assam in the 15th and 16th centuries, with Srimanta Sankaradeva (1449-1568), the great saint poet as its fountainhead. The term Sattriya is a new appellation appended to the form of dance preserved and practiced traditionally in the Sattra institutions of Assam. This institution was envisaged by Sankaradeva and his principal apostle and successor Madhavadeva (1489-1596) as the repository of learning. The Sattriya Dance follows some traditional principles supported by written texts of Indian classical dance. Those contain the grammar of the performance pattern with mathematical precision in terms of melodic and rhythmic structure, aesthetics, footworks and hand gestures etc. A distinct system of melody and rhythm, not akin to other forms, has given this tradition a separate entity besides the nritta and natya elements of it. Many of the dance numbers forming the large repertoire of the Sattriya, constituted a major part of the plays of the Sankaradeva and Madhavadeva, the enactment of which is called Ankiya Bhaona. It was a powerful device for the propagation of Bhakti, which at the same time combined nritya ,natya and sangita. There are several dance numbers outside the Ankiya Bhaona as well. The Sattriya Dance has coined and appended local vocabulary for the grammar and angika abhinaya aspects like gaits, stance and body postures without departing from the basic principles of the classical dance treatises. It has thus two distinct set of repertoire – the one centering round the Ankiya Bhaona and the other, independent of this form of theatrical performances. As mentioned earlier, Sattriya is embellished within a unique Raga and Tala pattern set to a large corpus of compositions of Sankaradeva and Madhavadeva and which are also hailed as great literary works and in technique it strictly follows the principles of Tandava and Lasya.

With the passage of time the dialectic of tradition and modernity have also developed in this form.Although originally preserved and practised in the Sattra institution as a means of cultivating Bhakti and being done even today, the Sattriya has now also taken the new dimension of a distinct performing art form of secular, aesthetic and academic interest. In contrast to early period women have also participated in the performing arena and in the presently the women performers are gradually increasing dominating the performance scenario of present stage. But even then, the basic principle of Bhakti is always there because of the sources of the themes being taken mostly from the Bhagavat Purana with special emphasis on Lord Krishna as the only adorable deity. He is also conceived as the Natavara and all sentiments expressed in course of depicting different themes tend to merge ultimately in the sentiment of Bhakti.