Chidambaram Natyanjali

The Chidambaram Natyanjali festival holds a special place in my heart. I used to be a part of SAHER (Society for Archaeological, Historical and Epigraphical Research) as a participant in their courses on these subjects and went to tours of monuments with Dr.Nagaswamy in the seventies. He was planning Natyanjali festival and I became a part of the organising group assisting him in Chennai and writing about it for the Indian Express in the first few years. I danced there too. See the first picture of me dancing in the first Natyanjali in 1981. I am wearing Shanthakka's costume. This picture was taken by dear friend Sunda who was with BBC and passed away in Australia. Mrs.sundaralingam, daughter Subhadra and Son in Law Sanchayan remain great friends.

In the picture below (which I scanned from Sruti Magazine), I am standing on the left watching Pt.Durgalal and Jayant Kastuar dance kathak inside the temple in 1984. Jayant had come to Chennai to assist his Guru Pt.Durgalal in his lec dem at the Natya kala conference. I interviewed Pt.Durgalal for Sruti Magazine and became a good friend of Jayant who was then doing his PhD at JNU. I wrote about Pt.Durgalal's performance at Chidambaram in The Indian Express. There is a lovely picture of Pt.Durgalal swirling taken by Gajendran who was then with Indian Express and later retired from The Hindu. Will scan that article and put in this. I had danced in the same space "Enneramum undan sannidhiyil irukka vendum iyya" sung by Prof.C.V.Chandrasekhar who spontaneously decided to sing for me.