The slight change is weather has made it the best time to go and watch the children who are giving performances in the national Capital as National School of Drama’s 9th Bal Sangam commenced on Saturday.
Inaugurated by BP Singh, former Governor of Sikkim, Krishna Kumari Mathur, Renowned Nautanki Director and actor and Sanjiv Mittal, Joint Sectary, Ministry of Culture, government of India, in the presence of Waman Kendre and TIE Co. chief Abdul Latif Khatana, the five day event is being held at the National School of Drama campus.
The inaugural performance Khela saw the performance by 500 child artists of India who performed different kinds of dance forms. Choreographed by Dr Laique Hussain the performance saw and mash up of folk, martial arts and songs from states like Rajasthan, Manipur, Assam, Jharkhand, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Odisha, Kashmir, Arunachal Pradesh, Gujarat, Mizoram and Delhi. To add to the festivities, longmans, clowns, dhol drummers, tight rope walker, jugaad band performers, acrobats, jugglers, behrupiyas, magicians, kacchi-ghodi performers, kathputli exponents, and many more will converge on different days to present the cultural heritage of the country.
A highlight of this year’s ‘Bal Sangam’ will be the regional folk performances, like Chhou from West Bengal, Yakshagana from Karanataka, Bhand Pather from Jammu & Kashmir and Rass Leela from Manipur. This together with five workshops on Paper Puppet making, origami, Madhubani paintings, mask making and potter craft will prove to be an exciting experience for the young children.
Talking more about this year’s edition of ‘Bal Sangam’, Abdul Latif Khatana, Chief, TIE Co. said, “Bal Sangam’ is an effort to bring folk and urban face to face. Where there are children today lost in the internet and technology, TIE festival brings the open and varied folk to the kids of today, amalgamating the past and the future in the present.”
Waman Kendre, Director, National School of Drama said, “This ‘Bal Sangam’ is an unique effort to expose the children and young citizens to real strength of Indian folk and traditional performing arts. It is also an effort to understand the roots of our heritage and cultural treasure. ‘Bal Sangam’ is about sharing, learning, teaching, enriching and gaining confidence for showing our indigenous cultural identity while facing the globe.”
Also during this year’s ‘Bal Sangam’, the NSD authorities will be making special arrangements through various NGO working with underprivileged children and social organisations to reach out and invite children from the not so privileged class so as to give them the due privilege to experience and be enriched by this long awaited festival of National School of Drama for children.