Dance to Freedom: From Ghungroos Gunpowder

Email

Whatsapp

Facebook

Pinterest

Twitter

Copy link

Dance in India has a rich heritage spanning centuries, evolving into a unique art form that has gracefully adapted and transformed, showcasing a myriad of vibrant hues over time. The tawaifs have contributed greatly to its evolution and transformation, and in many cases, they have been at the forefront of developing the Hindustani variety of dance and music that has kept the audience hooked to it over centuries and continues to enthrall them even today.

The term 'tawaif' once denoted a noble, exalted, elite, and dignified woman, but with the massive political changes taking place in the country, its meaning deteriorated, as did the attitude with which people looked at the ladies belonging to this class. While they flourished during the Muslim period with some roadblocks under some rulers like Aurangzeb, the rule of the British did them the greatest harm as they bracketed the practitioners of these fine arts with prostitutes, which brought them a bad name and social censure. Over centuries, tawaifs experienced a stark societal shift- from a period when nobles and the wealthy felt proud on being seen in their company, even sending their children for etiquette training, to a time when they were looked at as a blot on the society.

This is a complex journey over centuries in which the tawaifs saw their trade touch the zenith of popularity and then fall to irredeemable depths.

The tawaifs, however, were very ingenious as they adapted to the new environs developing around them while simultaneously guarding their traditional form by standing up to face the challenges that the British Raj threw at them. There are scores of them who confronted and did their bit in the fight against the foreign masters. Some of them are very popular to the extent that people do not accept them as tawaifs at all, as is the case with Begum Hazrat Mahal.

However, the contribution of most of them has been vastly overlooked. They have been reduced to mere footnotes, while many others are not considered worthy enough for even this.

We also have a third category of these tawaifs whose contribution to the freedom struggle has survived only in folktales at the local level without any substantial evidence.

In this book, I have included the tawaifs belonging to all three categories who stood up against the British boldly. The sacrifices of these tawaifs, although varying, are exemplary example of unprecedented courage. Some of them died fighting or faced death penalties, while others suffered horrible injustice at the hands of the mighty and resourceful imperialists.

It was an enduring and adventurous journey of research that included diving into the annals of history to locate the nuggets of information because, in most cases, the records were either not created or were wiped out. This was especially the case when a nautch girl was linked to a person who had earned a worthy place in our history, as people thought that they could be a blot on the exalted name of the freedom fighter. One can find solace in the fact that, in some cases, their stories have filtered down to generations in the form of folktales, folksongs, and legends.