Home / Sunday-mid-day / / Article /
‘No guarantee no one will be offended’
Updated On: 07 August, 2022 09:33 AM IST | Mumbai | Yogesh Pawar
As Mumbai gets a taste of 17th century Hindi literature which unabashedly celebrated female sexuality, Shubha Mudgal, who put this poetry to music last week, discusses the message in music
Listen to this article :
Shubha Mudgal in concert with Aneesh Pradhan on tabla and Sudhir Nayak on the harmonium, presenting poetry that celebrated the woman as goddess, yogini and nayika. PIC COURTESY/DHRUV SETHI
In a fortnight when an FIR was filed against Bollywood actor Ranveer Singh for deciding to pose in the buff for a British magazine and post the images on social media, Hindustani classical vocalist Shubha Mudgal sang for a woman who had a bone to pick with her sister-in-law who labelled her bereft of passion like a Brindavan widow. Perhaps Mudgal, whose repertoire includes thumri and khayal, may have been as baffled as a majority of Indian women, wondering who exactly the Mumbai-based lawyer whose complaint the FIR was based on, was speaking for when she said Singh exposing his “bum” is “a national issue” because it insulted the modesty of women.
At a concert titled, Women, Sexuality, and Song, which opened a women-led Indian classical music festival by the National Centre for the Performing Arts (NCPA) in Mumbai, Mudgal sang for and represented every kind of Indian woman—goddess, yogini and nayika alike, some with immense beauty, others with greying tresses, and then some stigmatised by patriarchy. “Some [of this poetry] celebrates womanhood and sensuality [Dakhin jayiyo ji, ke layiyo hamein Dhanushpuri/Get me a Dhanushpuri saree from the Deccan] and other songs speak of the challenges and stigma women face [Saasu mori kaheli bajhaniya, nanad Brijbasin ho/Rama jinke mein baari re biyahi, ooyi ghar se nikaaren ho/My mother-in-law calls me barren, my sister-in-law says I’m bereft of passion like a Brindavan widow/And the man I was married to when young has abandoned me],” she says.
Read Next Story
Trending Stories
Latest Photos
Latest Videos
Latest Web Stories
ADVERTISEMENT
Mid-Day Fast
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT