Paper: 2

Relationship Of Dance And Theatre, Study Of Rupaka And

Uparupaka, Traditional Theatres Of India

Module 25 Jatra

In Bengali the meaning of the word Jatra is to travel from one place

to another. Even processions are included in this travel idea. Several

ancient texts mention Jatra. In Skanda Purana we find twelve kinds of

Jatras are cited each held in one of the twelve months. These are

usually festivals held for the worship of Vishnu all over the year. They

are

Chandani Jatra- held in the month of Baishakh i.e. April-May

Snapuni Jatra – held in Jaitha i.e. May June

Rathyatra Jatra - held in Asharh i.e. during June-July

Sayani Jatra - held in Shravan

Dakshin Parshia Jatra - held in Bhadra

Bamparshia Jatra - held in Aswin

Uthhani Jatra - held in Kartik

Chhadni Jatra - held in Agrahayan

Puspabhishekh Jatra - held in Poush

Salyodni Jatra - held in Magh

Dol Jatra - held in Phalgun

Madanbhanjika Jatra – held in Chaitra

In Bamkeshar Tantra there are sixteen Jatras mentioned held in

different months.

Mancha Jatra and Chandan Jatra- held in the month of

Baishakh i.e. April-May

Mahasnan Jatra –held in Jaitha i.e. May June

Rathyatra Jatra - held in Asharh i.e. during June-July

Jala Jatra - held in Shravan

Dhunan Jatra - held in Bhadra

Mahapuja Jatra - held in Aswin

Deepa Jatra - held in Kartik

Nabanna Jatra - held in Agrahayan

Angarag Jatra - held in Poush

Magadevi Jatra - held in Magh

Dol Jatra - held in Phalgun

Duti Jatra, Ras Jatra, Basanti Jatra and Nil Jatra – held in Chaitra

So we see that the Jatras mentioned in ancient texts and literature

are only social and religious festivals and did not specify any art

form. This statement seems all the truer when we see that a number

of ancient Sanskrit plays are written to be performed in the Jatra

festivals. Like Bhavabhuti wrote Uttaramcharit and Malatimadhava

for the Kalpriyanath Jatra.

Jatra is an initiative where people gather for rites, rituals, devotion

and entertainment. Thus these became festivals for the society. In

ancient times Jatra was also counted as a festival and theatre or

drama was almost a compulsory part of it. The reason of naming the

ritualistic worship in a place also as Jatra is found in the fifteenth

volume of Biswakosh. It says that though Jatra was initiated as a

religious procession along with kirtan singing in the preliminary state,

but gradually people began to confine the activities of the procession

and its rituals in a chosen place and hence the total activity became a

static occasion. But these occurrences carried forward the name

Jatra. Later on, the elements of the art of acting were added to this

devotional singing and dancing ceremony. This new emerged form of

performance is now coined as Jatrapala.

The chief areas of the performance of Jatra are Bihar, Bengal, Orissa

and Assam in the eastern India.

Hemanta Kumar Das opines regarding Oriya Jatra, “We do not know

exactly when this powerful medium came to be known as Jatra. But

one thing is clear that it was widely known under that name during

Sarala Das’ time….This was at least a century before Chaitanya’s

arrival at Puri and the appearance of Krishna Jatra in Bengal …

However it must be added that Oriya Jatra came in contact with

Bengali Jatra during the 19th century and since then it has always

depended upon it for inspiration.” From the beginning Oriya Jatra

received the favor and patronage of rural as well as the urban

people. In Orissa it is in true sense a mass performing art media.

Primarily the stories here are also based on mythology, religious

themes, history and story of individuals. Social plays have very major

contribution in this art form. Now-a-days famous film stories are also

adapted along with technical advancements like sound, lights and

other aids are adapted in the performance, which they think are

important to continue the fight with electronics media and cinema.

In Bihar, Jatra is a folk dance of the Oraons, who are tribes supposed

to be emigrated from Nepal. These Oraons have three dances - Jatra,

Karma and Jadur. Interestingly Jatra here represents the fight of life

and the technique includes a lot of martial movements. The

movements are fast and display energy. During the dance a musician

stands in the center of the performing arena and sings the songs in

such a way that the delivery serves in motivating the dancers. The

songs are sung in Nepali. Among many instruments that are used is

the Dholak.

In Assam Jatra is performed as the bhavna. These presentations

include religious stories taken from Sanskrit literature. Masks are a

special feature of this presentation.

Bengal has contributed greatly to this art form. In Bengal the festival

of the local folk deities is called Jata. Some are of opinion that Jatra

has derived its name from this Jata. Whatever be the origin the

historians of Bengali dramatic literature have linked its origin to

Natgeet, which was actually sung in festivals that were called Jatra.

Hence gradually the word Jatra took the place of Natgeet. However,

the history of Bengali literature points to the Jangam festival, which

people referred to as Jatra. This Jangam too was a religious

procession.

The Natyashastra stands as a proven fact of the prevalence of Natya

in India. But according to Biswakosh, Jatra was a common

patronizing art form of the Hindu kings. It narrates that the actors

with all make up and costume would sit in the performance area

commonly called the asar/असर. As per their appearance sequence according to the story, each actor would stand up, sing, dance and

act the character. This is an example of Jatra being a separate kind of

performing art, which is not guided by the Natyashastra technique.

So it is obvious that the dramatists are not in the lineage of Bhasa,

Kalidasa or Sudraka, the Sanskrit dramatists.

Around 15th century, Baru Chandidas of Bankura-Birbhum area of

Bengal wrote Srikrishna kirtana/श्रीक्रिष्ण कीर्तन. Prior to this between 1473 and 1480 Maladhar Basu of the village of Kulin in Bardhhaman

wrote the first Bengali literature on the theme of Krishna named

Srikrishna Vijay. In 1494 Jasiraj Khan wrote Krishna Panchali/कृष्णा पाांचाऱी. In 1495 Biprodas Piplai of Basirhat wrote Manasabijoy. Kabindra Parameswar of Chatttogram wrote Pandav Bijoy. From this

time onwards we find a definite development of the elements of

Bengali drama. The stories of Manasa (the serpent God), his kind of

Dharma, Chandi and other local mythology along with Ramayana,

Krishnalila were taken as theme and presented through songs,

dance, music and narration. These kinds of oral tradition

presentation were now penned down by the writers and poets. Thus

Srikrishnakirtana of Baru Chandidas was the first writing on the story

of Radha Krishna and it is presented with dialogues and songs

illustrating the story line. In the introductory episode the depiction of

the birth of Radha and Krishna takes place;then follows twelve more

episodes on Krishna’s life cycle in this play- such as

Tambulakhanda/र्म्बुऱाखांड, Dankhanda/दांखांड, Noukakhanda/नौकाखांड, Bharkhanda/भाखडं, Chhatrakhanda/छात्रखांड, Vrindavanakhanda/वनृ्दावनखांड, Kaliyadamankhanda/कालऱयादमनखांड, Yamunakhanda/यमुनाखांड, Harkhanda/हखडं, Vankhanda/वनखांड, Vangshikhanda/वांग्शीखांड and Virahakhandaववरहखांड. All these episodes could not be performed in one day. They were performed on

different days. The word pala was already in existence in Bengal. So

with each episode the word pala was added now. So the episodes

became Tambulakhanda Pala, Dankhanda Pala and so on.

Sri Chaitanya was born in 1486, while Srikrishnakirtana was written

in 1500. So during the life of Chaitanya Srikrishnakirtana was already

prevailing. In Srikrishnakirtana generally the songs are dialogue-

oriented and hence had a dramatic structure. There are three main

characters -- Krishna, Radha and Barai (the messenger) - all three

characters present their dialogues in tune. In this way the story is

described and the dramatic moments developed. Hence

Srikrishnakirtana is often called by various names like the

Gitinatyakavya/गगतर्नात्याकव्य or the Natyagiti/नाटयगतर् by the scholars. But nobody could deny this as a Natya as the dramatic

elements were present.

During the time of Chaitanya, Krishnakirtana and Krishnajatra was

already prevalent but Chaitanya added a different dimension to the

Krishnajatra. He introduced the costume and make-up according to

the characters. Around the first half of the 16th century we find Sri

Chaitanya had acted in Krishnalila/कृष्णऱीऱा. This performance is described in Sri Chaitanya Bhagavat of Brindavandas. Hence we may

conclude that it was Chaitanya who formulated the first stage of

Jatra in Bengal. But after Chaitanya till the 18th century there is not

much evidence of the development in Jatra.

In the 18th century the second phase of Jatra development began.

We find that different kinds of Jatra are now performed. Some of

these are Shakti Jatra, Nath Jatra, Pala Jatra and Krishna Jatra, which

was the most popular. In Krishna Jatra, the Kaliya Daman episode

was so popular that Krishna Jatra became famous as Kaliya Daman

Jatra also. At the end of this century Bidyasundar Pala of Bharat

Chandra was the most popular Jatra. But at the same time Jatras

incorporated cheap entertainment and hence its dignity started to

decline.

Shishuram Adhikary took up the task to revive the old glory of Jatra

and performed in it. He introduced prose dialogues with songs. His

performances gave more importance to dialogues and the use of

songs was reduced.

The next personality in Jatra to come up in the first half of the 19th

century was Premchand Adhikary. He acted and presented Krishna

Jatra and gained popularity. His disciple Badan Adhikary also

continued the same trend and opened his own company, called the

Badan Jatra. He wrote a number of Jatras that were performed.

In the beginning of the 19th century, another phase of the Jatra in

Bangladesh began. This was named as Natun Jatra (The New Jatra).

The old phase is now the Purano Jatra. So now we find two divisions

in Jatra- Natun and Purano. From the 16th century to the beginning of

the 19th century is the phase of the Purano Jatra. In this phase we

observe that these palas/पऱास based themselves on the religious and devotional themes, like Krishna Jatra, Ram Jatra, Manashar Bhasan

Jatra, Shiva Jatra and Chandi Jatra. During this time Jatra was

individualistic. So the companies bore the names of the individual

personalities e.g. Paramananda Adhikary’s company, Krishnakamal

Adhikary’s company, Gopal Ure’s company and so on. These

companies were professional in nature and were controlled by the

owner (called the Adhikary) of the company.

The Natun Jatra-s, however, were run by rich individuals, but in an

amateur manner. Their content was secular in nature. The main aim

was entertainment and these became their status symbol. These

owners also spent a lot of money too. In this new phase, the notable

point is that in 1849 the team of Ramchand Mukhopadhyay

performed a Jatra named Nanda Biday. In this the women took part

for the first time in Jatra. The vocal rendition part developed now

and we find the inclusion of classical ragas, khayal/खयाऱ, tappa/टप्प,

hafakhrai/हफाखरै, payar/पयार rhythm in dialogues and kirtana started being used. Dance was also included along with songs now.

Expensive costumes and makeup was introduced. The Pala

NalaDamayanti, Raja Bikramaditya, Nanda Biday and Bidya Sundar

Pala are very prominent plays in this phase.

Sri Chaitanya Dev in his acting had deviated from the then prevalent

style of acting on singing. He introduced prose dialogues in Krishna

Kirtana along with narrative singing. Prior to this, dialogues were not

used. His presentation did not conform to the Sanskrit theatre

tradition. In his performance the entrance and exit of the characters

in the performance arena was used. Scholars opine that this system

may not have existed earlier. From his performance scholars derive

that in the medieval age the characteristics of Jatra Pala were the

following:

There were no ready/written dialogues in the performance. But

the songs were fixed.

The actors delivered the dialogues on extempore basis,

following the songs. They also performed danced and acted

accordingly.

The men acted in the roles of both male and female characters.

The comedy in the presentation would be rendered through

the characters of aged persons.

In the 19th century Govinda Adhikary reformed Krishna Jatra.

From this time onwards the prose dialogues took up a major

part of the presentation.

The other reformers of Jatra are Shishuram, Sridam Das,

Suboldas Adhikary and Manomohan Basu.

One of the notable persons who reformed Jatra in the 2nd half

of 19th century was Madanmohan Chattopadhyay, who was a

professor in Hooghly College. He brought changes in costume,

make up, music, tune, dance and also instruments used in Jatra

Pala. He started with an amateur team, but his popularity made

him leave his job and take up Jatra as his profession and run

the team professionally. He changed the song performances in

Jatra also. His refined these songs by introducing classical ragas

and raginis. He also stressed on the expression of delivery of

the songs. Till his time the men took up the acting of female

characters. Naturally the female songs were sung in male voice.

But Madanmohan made young boys sing for the female

characters from the background. Also aged singers sang the

songs of the male characters. This new system gave rise to the

concept of Jurhy in Jatra. Later on Motilal Roy, Brajamohan Ray,

Paramananda Adhikary, Sridam Das, Subol Das and others

followed this pattern of presentation.

The style of the acting in Jatra can be divided into 5 types-

a. Acting with character analysis

b. Acting with stunt and pose.

c. Emotional acting

d. Melodramatic acting

e. Mixed style of acting.

Apart from these another style is perceived i.e. the lecture style.

Here the character while acting would often lecture on a relevant

contemporary topic.

On the basis of themes Jatra can be classified into 8 groups-

Mythological and devotional

Historical

Political

Social

Quasi-historical and metaphorical

Biographical

Dramatization from famous literary works

Adaptation from foreign plays and sources

There are three major trends of contents in the history ofJatra- the

mythological and devotional trend, history and quasi-history based

trend and socio-political trend. The first trend continued till the

World War II, the second trend prevailed from after the World War II

to 1965. From 1965 till date the third trend continues.

Elements of Jatra

Broadly there are six elements in Jatra. They are Music, Dialogues,

Stories or Plots, Characters, Mass Education, Exposition of Rasa or

sentiments.

The Presentation

For Jatra the music part is divided into the following divisions:

a. Prastavana Geeti

b. Jurhi Gaan

c. Dohar

d. Ekanebalaker Gaan

e. Ganer Gaan

f. Jatra Duet

g. Jatra Ballet

h. Bibeker Gaan

Prastavana Gaan: This is an invocatory song where the theme of the

play is introduced.

Jurhi Gaan: The musical dialogue of a character is often sung by

another person or by a group. This system of presentation is called

the Jurhi Gaan. If the actor was a good singer, then he would sing by

his own and would not need a Jurhi to help him.

Dohar: It is a group of singers who sing together. There are two

divisions of Dohar: 1. Aag Dohar and 2. Pach Dohar. In the group the

person who sings for the character and leads the group is called the

Aag Dohar. The rest who join in as a group are the Pach Dohar.

Ekanebalaker Gaan: The word ekane means lonely and balak is boy.

So it is the song that represents the sorrow of a lonely boy in

distressed condition and is sung by the character himself.

Ganer Gaan: The word Gan is the mass. This mass song speaks of

protest or stresses on many social issues. The characters, who sings

this song are the group of many religious people like Vaishnava,

Shaktas, the Sakhis of Radha and so on.

Jatra Duet: It is a duet dance of a male and a female of low caste

characters. They dance to entertain people and often had vulgar

movements. These were in no way related to the main story. These

served as comic relief in the presentation.

Jatra Ballet: In the beginning of the 20th century, Haripada

Chattopadhaya and Mathurnath Saha introduced a group dance

composed by proper dance teachers. But these were again not

directly related to the theme of the play. These served as

entertainment of the audience. The first Jatra where this was

incorporated was the Padmini Pala. As this became very popular,

such dances became an inevitable presentation in Jatra from then

on.

Bibek/बबबेक: A singer who sings the songs of the soul of the character is called the Bibek. The content of these songs expose the truth.

The music in Jatra is of four types: Concert, Mood Music, Sound

Effect and Atmosphere Music.

The Technique

There are five fundamentals in the technique of Jatra:

a. Aasar, the area of performance

b. Lights

c. Costume and Make up

d. Sangit/सांगीर् e. Acting style

From the above discussion we find that Jatra is one of the major

theatrical forms, which evolved with the aim to disseminate religion.

During evolution it incorporated the stories from mythology, history

and quasi historical stories written by playwrights and poets. But

during this time it became the status symbol of the rich people of

Bengal. The form was used here neither for propagation of religion

nor as a true connoisseur of art. Cheap entertainment brought the

decadence of this beautiful prospectus media. But it is observed by

the then educated people, not rich with money, but with adequate

education even some of them were academicians came forward to

work with this form. Some of them were Shishuram Adhikary,

Madanmohan Chatterjee called as Madan master. With their efforts

Jatra came up with proper shape shredding off the unnecessary use

of songs, dance and the vulgar gestures are removed. Again the

commoners became interested on this presentation. Jatra now

became a mass entertainment and medium of mass education. In the

next phase Jatra entered into its modern period, where along with

mythology, history, quasi-history the social plays took prominent

positions. Commercially the Jatra become an industry of performing

art. Notable actors and actresses, directors and playwrights of other

media particularly the theatre and cinema contributed in it. The

names of Utpal Dutta, Uttamkumar, Supriya Devi and Asit Mukherjee

are worth mentioning. The western plays are adapted for Jatra now.

Productions like Othello, Macbeth, King Lear and even plays of Ibsen

were taken in. Political ideologies also were incorporated in the

productions, like Sannyasir Tarabari, Ajoy Vietnam.

A performing media in Indian history with such professional and

commercial attitude is a rare incident in the history of performing

arts.

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