Chennai: Sri Parthasarathy Swami Sabha Dance festival – ‘Bharat Nrithya Utsav’ was inaugurated at Narada Gana Sabha, Alwarpet Saturday. The 53-day dance festival will conclude 10 March.
Sri Parthasarathy Swami Sabha vice-president and former Soliciter General Mohan Parasaran inaugurated the festival and presented Natya Kalasarathy award to Bharatanatyam exponent Anitha Guha and Mohiniyattam exponent Gopika Varma in recognition of their dedicated and continued services to the filed of Bharatanatyam.
Cliveland Sundaram, Kalashetra Foundation director Revathy Ramachandran and Urmila Satyanarayanan felicitated the awardees.
Speaking on the occasion, sabha secretary, M Krishnamurthy said, “More than 140 Bharatanatyam artistes and experts in other classical dance forms from across the country and abroad are set to enthral the audience at the dance festival.”
Artistes from the US and Singapore will take part. Artistes and students of dance from Chennai, Coimbatore, Chidambaram, Salem, Periyakulam, Tirupur, and Madurai, will represent the State.
The event will also feature those from Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Mumbai, Pune, Delhi, Gurgaon, and Kolkata, a press release said.
From 20 January, the festival will shift to R K Swamy Auditorium on Sundareswarar Street, Mylapore. The programmes start at 5.45 pm on all days.
On the valedictory day, the sabha will present certificates and cash awards to 25 best performers in the festival.