arts and culture Archives - DU Beat - Delhi University's Independent Student Newspaper

Lurking in the dark corners of lost Mughal provinces is the glory past of bejewelled necks and lavishly costumed bodies of heaven romancing to the rhythmic tunes of royal melodies-the tawaifs, the mujre wali, and the kothewali. The cultural treasures and artistic geniuses of then, now social outcasts and sexual objects of an institutionalized patriarchy.

‘Mujra’, a word often associated with eroticism or sexual dance styles, born of an Oudhi origin, was a performing art form solely reserved for the womb it was birthed at, that is, the royal courts. Under the tutelage of Nawab Wajid Ali Shah, the final king of Awadh, two storytellers known as Kathaks, Kalka Maharaj and Bindadeen Maharaj, expanded and perfected the classical dance form of Kathak, adding more drama and seduction till it was refined to Mujra. This dancing style was learnt and improved by the Nawab himself, who was a dancer of great skill and finesse. Therefore, the Ustads who were recognised with starting the Lucknow Gharana of Kathak later became the creators of Mujra.

Derived from the Marathi language, Mujra literally means ‘to bow down’. Before beginning a performance, it is customary for dancers to bow and pay respect to God, their Guru, and the audience. Namaskar and Salaami
tukdas/todas of Kathak have kept this alive. It was most likely this act of Mujra, or paying respect, that gave the performance its name. This symbolism can be seen in famous folk Bhajans of Uttar Pradesh like Ram Jharokhe- “राम झरोखे बैठ के सबका मुजरा ले, जैसी जाकी चाकरी वैसा वाको दे” (Lord Ram watches us all through
a window and rewards us in accordance with the intensity of our obeisance towards him.)

Holding these tokdas in the delicat elegance of their palm were Tawaifs. Contrasting popular connotations,
they were courtesans similar to Japan’s Geishas. Well-known culturists, aesthetes, collectors, and entertainers, they were artists who passively consumed the patronage they had received. The Tawaifs were the most powerful group of female citizens and made the most of their direct access to powerful males. They were supposed to be affluent in Hindi and Urdu languages, and learn poetry and literature. In a place known for being extremely competitive, only the wittiest and most self-assured remained. They were the first wave of feminists in the Indian peninsula and possessed land, which was a privilege enjoyed by few males, save for any woman. It was the incoming British who cracked down on Tawaifs under the guise of social cleansing in order to end kinship-based authority and destroyed the indigenous dynasty. To lessen their power over their respective leaders, the Tawaifs were stripped of their possessions and territory.

In the early 1800s, the British turned them into prostitutes and prohibited Mujra through a number of laws. A social purity movement that attacked non-hetero, noncis, LGBTQ+ citizens began soon after. Anti-courtesan laws were introduced in an effort to combat STDs. The governments of India and Pakistan adopted this atmosphere of shame after their respective independences. In Mumbai, the dance bars where the contemporary Mujra was practised were forbidden. The tawaifs of Pakistan were expelled to the outskirts of the city during the rule of the military ruler Zia-Ul-Haq.

After then, the Kotha facility was turned into a brothel, and Mujra was transformed into a suggestive and borderline filthy erotic dance show. For India’s indigenous performing arts, this was a horrible and irreparable loss, as a vast array of songs and dance forms also perished along with their keepers.

Mujra now takes the contemporary, reduced-down form of Bollywood songs like Salame Ishq and Inn Akhon
Ki Masti Ke performances in bars and wedding parties for a hefty price and a lowly occupation. According
to Kabir Kakkar, the talent manager of Lucknow’s K4 Entertainment Pvt. Ltd.,

“In Lucknow, most dancers are Indian, but the ‘big money’ dancers are from Uzbekistan, Russia, and Ukraine, paid between Rs 5,000 and Rs 25,000 per one-hour show. They are trained in Kathak or Bharatnatyam, and some have picked up mujra expressions and gestures from films like Umrao Jaan.”

The maker of the same film Umrao Jaan, Muzaffar Ali, claims that what we see now is not mujra. It’s all very
commercial and physical, as he puts it. “The art, where is it?”

The status quo of these dancing groups remains hazy with the transforming identity of what it is to be a ‘Mujre Wali’. They substitute their menial occupation with jobs in IT sectors, modeling agencies, and small acting roles in television serials. Because as accounted by one of these dance group owners, “It’s a bit demeaning to call them just mujra girls.

Aayat Farooqui

[email protected]

Keep Reading

Thinking of revolutionary movies our screens found two movies released at a gap of 22 years but even after years telling the distraught and torn state of the land of hypocrisies and diversities, the land that is our nation.

“Pandit Nehru made a horological mistake. At the stroke of midnight when India awoke to ‘light and freedom’, the world was not asleep. It was for instance, around two-thirty in the afternoon in New York,

This is how a 2005 film by Sudhir Mishra Hazaaron Khwaishein Aisi begins. Set in the background of the Emergency period and the rise of the Naxal Bari movement in India. Another movie, Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro by Kundan Shah from 1983, irrespective of its backdrop the movie can be located in any time frame except for its humour which has decayed to some extent.

Jane Bhi Do Yaaro takes us on a ride of satire, social reflection, old-time comedy and the corrupt trio of media, corporates and administration. Two common men who set up a Photo Studio wait for their fates to take wings as they sit in Old Bombay’s Haji Ali area waiting for their customers. Upon getting hopeless, Naseeruddin Shah accompanied by Ravi Baswani sings “Ham Honge Kamyab…Ek din”. The hymn is followed by words, “Work which is done with utter determination always yields to good results.” Something we often hear on Sundays while lying around doing nothing. But the question that follows this dialogue sums up the fate of lacs of people in India, ‘When’?

Setting aside my procrastination, this is a huge reason why I have given up on the self-help genre. Various problems faced by so many generations don’t spring up from waking up late or being hazy at work. Or maybe I have learnt the art of putting the blame for everything on societal problems. What follows the dream of these two photographers in Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro can be called a theatrical mess enveloped with satire but a true picture of my beloved country.

Meanwhile, Hazaaron Khwaishein Aisi follows the life of three individuals, Siddharth, Geeta and Vikram set in a love triangle. Both of our male leads open their character lines with letters written to Geeta. Siddharth, the son of a Muslim man and a Bengali woman coming from a highly privileged background has been radicalised as his ‘beliefs have strengthened’. He says ‘We have to change the world and change it fundamentally’. It’s not so hard to locate a Siddharth in today’s Delhi University as well. A person of high class talking about revolution, saying life is not all about English education while talking in English. He holds the bravado at the start and doesn’t restrict his craving for revolution only to words and slogans, he goes to Bhojpur, in the heart of the action.

Vikram on the other hand is a child of the middle class whose father is a Gandhian socialist. He says his father’s main profession is to worry but it would have been great if he would have worried about his children. He goes on to become a fixer, involved with corrupt politicians while being madly in love with Geeta. Geeta, believed to be the strongest character, isn’t really an ideologue as Sudhir Mishra himself says

“Geeta is a person who doesn’t expect the world to change because she wishes it to. That’s why she is the only one left sane and standing in the end. ”

The movie tries to show the side of left radicalisation which remains only in slogans and talks and is highly romanticised. The movie begins in St. Stephens where Siddharth and his mates come up on a stage and tell students about the ‘new world order’. Such politics exists in university spaces till now, and at the start, it looks the most revolutionary and ‘world changing’, only until you realise they are just words for many.

The street play societies indeed can be an example that is thriving in front of us all. The plays might talk about dozens of problems in society with shining metaphors. Still, the same societies run on strict hierarchies and maintain the status quo that they wish to dismantle in their plays. When his life is in extreme danger, Siddharth returns to his father to the same class that he feigned about.

Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro on the other hand showcases how two common men find themselves trapped in the corrupt trio that holds the power to dictate lives. The media that lures and threatens to reveal the truth or deceit, isn’t hard to relate given the extremes we have seen in our media channels in the past few years. The two men discover the murderer of an official and think of the media as their allies while they are being entrapped in deceit. The last scene brings them all on a stage where Saleem and Anarkali meet the scenes of Mahabharata while the curtain falls on two men being held guilty for being two common men. In between the dazzling costumes and humorous exchange, lie the words Satyamev Jayate at one corner under webs and dirt.

Hazaaron Khwaishein Aisi brings in the ideological dilemma and the wish to change the order in the forefront. Many might watch it for Swanand Kirkire’s melody Bawara Mann while for many it’s a radical movie to be watched so as to become a part of the revolution talks in their groups. Many might watch Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro just for young Naseeruddin Shah (guilty). But both of these movies attempted to showcase something both in their content and in their cinematic form.

Writers like me might act at the shock value delivered and write something pessimistic about the country’s way of being while humming notes of “Hum Honge Kamyab”. To call these movies revolutionary or not, cannot be decided by an article, for some say even 3 Idiots changed their way of thinking, so was it revolutionary, in any way? The words of Siddharth in his letter to Geeta have stayed with me for they in a lot of ways describe our generation as well.