Artistes exert a pivotal influence on their surroundings. Exemplifying the creative urge and the inward gaze, no matter what the art form they practise, they are thought leaders. The year gone by deprived us of grievously large numbers of artistes, thanks to COVID-19 or old age, or perhaps the sheer stress of the times we live in.
Two among them remind us that in their passing, another kind of demise is becoming equally obvious. It is just as painful to accept, but unlike death for mortals, it is not an inevitable force. We have been witnessing the demise of one kind of India – one that many of us were proud of and patriotic about.
It was a kaleidoscope of innumerable tiny things and not a steamroller of corporate gloss. ‘Gandhian’ was not synonymous with ‘outmoded’. Artistes were not expected to be on a perpetual publicity crusade. And ‘unity in diversity’ was no mere slogan but discernible in a million innocuous ways — in the widespread use of Hindustani as a conversational language across much of North India and commercial films; in fashionable styles of salwar-kameez and shararas; the exchange of festive food platters among neighbours of different religions; the way many folks, educated in pre-partition India, could write in Urdu as well as Devanagari script; and how most ordinary tourists at pilgrimage centres took the proximity of mosques to temples as facts of history, rather than evidence of a conspiracy involving minorities in contemporary India.
That old India was also one where duty to family and society came before indulgence of the individual, yet hyper-nationalism was not audible from street corners.
The old India
Change is inevitable, but institutions, constitutions, founding principles and cultural fabric — these are supposed to outlive the generations, not crumble or die. Two torchbearers of this fast declining India were the feisty, ever cheerful 66-year-old Ustad Iqbal Ahmed Khan (25 November 1956 – 17 December 2020), who left the entire Dilli gharana of Hindustani music and his myriad admirers bereft; and veteran choreographer Yog Sunder (16 July 1921 – 27 November 2020), whose creativity and alertness made him seem young at 99.
While Iqbal Ahmed Khan was a link in a long artistic legacy and groomed from birth to take his place among generations of musical geniuses of his gharana, Yog Sunder Desai inherited a tradition of breaking out of the mould. He was the son of Darbar Gopaldas Desai, a princely ruler of Dhasa state in Gujarat, who made history by giving up his principality to fight for independence.
Also read: With the Passing of Ustad Iqbal Ahmed, The Voice of a City That Once Was Has Been Extinguished
Besides participating in the Satyagraha movement, Gopaldas and his wife Bhaktiba worked for women’s education and eradication of untouchability. Yog Sunder was the only one among their children to take up the arts seriously.
Mahatma Gandhi exerted an early influence on Yogendra, as he was then called. He was educated at Gujarat Vidyapeeth, an institution founded by Gandhi. His education imbued with ideals like simple living and discipline, self-help and an egalitarian approach to group work was visible in all his later endeavours. As a teenager he attended Santiniketan. This choice too was influenced by Tagore’s association with Gandhi and the poet’s popularity in Gujarat, thanks to his song “Aikla Chalo” and other works like “Chitrangada” having been translated into Gujarati by Mahadev Desai, Gandhi’s close disciple and secretary.
At Santiniketan he learnt painting under Nandalal Bose and Manipuri under Guru Thambam Thamba. Wanting to immerse himself in dance, Yog Sunder took the advice of his Kathakali guru Kelu Nair and travelled to Kerala to learn from Kunchu Nair of Kalamandalam. He also learnt Mohiniattam — a rare step for a boy even today — from Kochumaru Amma, and secretly trained in Krishnattam, the exclusive art performed within the Guruvayoor temple. He topped up his eclectic dance education with Kathak under Pandti Bhure Lal in Bangalore.
Yog Sunder. Photo: YouTube
From his early days he took part in the freedom struggle, first as a child volunteer and then participating in the Rajkot Satyagraha and the Quit India Movement. When he started his dance company the Indian Revival Group (IRG), both its name that espoused the nationwide emotions of the time, and the principles on which it was founded were based on advice he received from Gandhi, who had told him to take art to the masses.
The choreographer’s daughter Papiha Desai, now leading the IRG, adds that Gandhi had also told him every endeavour should be self-supporting. Thus, alongside creating popular dance productions weaving together regional forms from across the country, he helped his fellow artistes make a living by selling tickets. His initial forays at running dance companies were cooperative enterprises.
Cooperative business models and putting one’s deepest beliefs on stage — these are concepts that have largely fallen away from the Indian dance world, labelled classical and professional but carrying a reputation as a hobby for the well-heeled. As for the absence of self-promotion characteristic of Yog Sunder and his kind, it is now considered a handicap.
Also read: When Classical Music Can Take the Listener to a State of Emotional Bliss and ‘Madness’
The artistic legacy
Iqbal Ahmed Khan’s simplicity of approach was similar to Yog Sunder’s. The genial Ustad, the khalifa or head of the Dilli gharana founded by Sufi mystic Amir Khusrau, bore on his shoulders a weight of learning that he never flaunted, merely putting it into practice through teaching and performance. He also subtly put into practice the truth that joy can be an act of resilience and resistance — an idea coming up in discussions around the world of late.
Ustad Iqbal Ahmed. Photo: Facebook/Ustad Iqbal Ahmed
Living in the heart of Old Delhi, he epitomised the Ganga-Jamuni tehzeeb that is turning into a nostalgia-soaked relic in today’s India ravaged by divisive politics. His son-in-law Imran Khan says the ustad never succumbed to despondence at the state of the nation. His perennial lightness of manner and enthusiastic demeanour, along with a never faltering commitment to his musical traditions, were his way of resisting the damaging onslaught.
At his ancestral home Mosiqui Manzil, where he resided till his last breath, he would recall the golden days of Hindustani music in the early years of independence, when stalwarts of every genre would visit his grandfather and guru, Ustad Chand Khan. He mentioned how in the monsoon they would sing Bahar ke prakaar (ragas of the Bahar family), while during the festival of Holi they would sing horis.
He had put numerous bhajans to music, and once when this writer was on a visit to Mosiqui Manzil, in the middle of the conversation he burst into verses in praise of Shiva — “Kripa samudram sumukham trinetram” and “Angikam bhuvanam yasya”. He recounted how on Durga Puja the musical get-togethers would continue till midnight at home, after which they would all visit the nearby temples. As with the art of his fellow musicians, he never failed to pay his respects to the faith of his fellow beings, recognising music as the one benevolent supreme.
Khusrau, through his works, shines as a symbol of India’s syncretic culture, and Khan inherited a vast repertoire of his compositions. He taught them liberally to male and female students, thus adding to their vibrancy. His compilation of Khusrau’s compositions for “Rudaad-e-Shireen”, sung by five female disciples and narrated by daughter Vusat, also featuring his own scintillating vocals, was an example of a production that brought the 13th century mystic to millennials.
This past year, with members of the Sursagar Society of Delhi Gharana, he had been organising aid for his fellow artistes whose finances had been crippled by the lockdown. And he never stopped singing.
Perhaps our best homage to the memory maestros Yog Sunder and Iqbal Ahmed Khan would be to stop the India they stood for from entirely disappearing.
Anjana Rajan has been writing on the arts, literature and society for nearly twenty years. She is a former deputy editor of The Hindu, a dance exponent and theatre practitioner.