Interview | Padma Shri Geeta Chandran Is Building A New Classical Dance Gurukul, Inclusive, Rigorous, And Rooted In Modern India
On the eve of her student's arangetram, Guru Geeta Chandran reflects on 51 years of Bharatanatyam, mentoring dancers, and the urgent need for policy reform.
Published : July 25, 2025 at 1:18 PM IST
The world may know her as a Padma Shri awardee, a Sangeet Natak Akademi laureate, and the founder of Delhi’s Natya Vriksha, or a Carnatic vocalist and a curator. But Guru Geeta Chandran is first and foremost a rasika: a connoisseur and conduit of beauty. ETV Bharat talked to her days before her disciple Kavya Navani’s upcoming arangetram (a milestone performance that marks the coming-of-age of a Bharatanatyam student). One could not have asked for a better moment to talk about the dance form that shaped her very marrow.
“I do not teach dance. I teach a way of living. I don’t look for talent, really,” she begins. “I look for thirst.”
It’s a statement that could be mistaken for poetic flourish, but she means it quite literally. At Natya Vriksha, her students are tested for the stamina to stay in pursuit. “The pedagogy here isn’t performance-oriented. That obsession with the spotlight; it’s not what I cultivate. What I cultivate is depth,” she declares. At Natya Vriksha, students learn not just the angularities of mudras and the exactitude of footwork, but also the physics of light, the palette of textiles, and the grammar of silence. It’s a gurukul of a modern kind that does not dilute rigour but retools it for the century we live in. And yet, its spirit is ancient: “The guru is not a coach. The guru is a mirror,” she says.
"For students from underprivileged backgrounds, the challenges differ. They possess an incredible thirst for knowledge. What they need is access to information and tools to convert it into viable knowledge. It is important to save them from becoming a 'Google-only' generation. Our pedagogy in dance literacy and education offers them a glimpse of a more meaningful alternative," adds the classical danseuse and vocalist.
The Forest and the Tree
Natya Vriksha, literally “the tree of dance,” is not a name chosen by accident. It is both a metaphor and a model: a root system that nourishes young artists until they are strong enough to bloom on their own. “Many of our students are first-generation learners,” she says. “They arrive with no cultural scaffolding... no tales from grandmothers, no shared rituals, no familiarity with the epics.” So, Natya Vriksha steps into that breach.
The syllabus expands to include storytelling, context-building, even guided viewing of temple architecture. “How can they dance Kaikeyi if they don’t know the Ramayana? How can they evoke Simhika if they haven’t walked through a forest in their own imagination?” There’s a poignancy to this. For in an age when mythology is either politicised or discarded, Guru Geeta Chandran insists that it can still be a lantern.
'My Stage Is Not Silent'
If one were to chart her choreographic oeuvre, it would resemble a constellation: Her Voice, Imagining Peace, Kaikeyi, Simhika: Daughter of the Forest, Remembering Gandhi: Warp and Weft, Mythologies Retold, Anekānta, Jayatu Bharatam. Each work a star illuminating a different part of the human condition.
How does she choose her themes? “When I am sufficiently provoked, artistically,” she says. “But never for propaganda. Aesthetics must lead the way.” This is what makes her political works stand apart. They do not sermonise. They embody through anklet and gaze, mudra and melody, she makes us feel what others only argue. “Simhika wasn’t just about forest rights,” she says. “It was about what it means to belong to land, and then be banished from it.” You do not leave her performances applauding alone. You leave questioning.
The Music In Her Spine
Unsurprisingly, music is not an accompaniment to her dance. It is its very root. “I’m a music fiend,” she says with glee. “My spine responds to music. I move when I hear it. I don’t even need choreography; it emerges.” She trained under Smt. Swarna Saraswathi, a rare gem of the Tanjavur isai velalar tradition, who taught her the inextricable bond between melody and motion.
“I often choreograph with my ears before my eyes,” she says. “The music tells me what the hand must do. What the eyebrow must say.” This intimacy with sound is what gives her performances their layered emotionality. It is not only the body that dances but also the voice, the breath, the blood.
On Governance And Gharanas
Ask her about what the Indian arts ecosystem needs, and she says wisely, “We have not created an ecosystem where a classical dancer can survive with dignity. There’s no policy framework. No benchmarks. No real infrastructure.” For someone with her stature, this is not mere complaint. The cost of costumes, musicians, rehearsal space, lighting all falls squarely on the artist. “You invest for 30 years,” she says, “and still can’t break even.”
Worse, she notes, there is no roadmap for young dancers. “Unlike music, where you move from All India Radio grades to concert circuits, dance has no such scaffolding. You’re left drifting.” Her critique is clear-eyed, but her love remains intact. “We’re still here,” she says, smiling. “We haven’t given up.”
What does it mean to her, in 2025, to watch a student debut on stage? “It’s not just a performance,” she says, her voice soft. “It’s a rite of passage, a witnessing.”
For Kavya Navani, the student who will ascend the stage this week, this is the culmination of years of tanpura tones, aching thighs, rewound recordings, tears, and triumphs. For Geeta Chandran, it is also a mirror: of her own journey, of the hundreds who came before, and of the sacred thread that binds them all.
“There is no shortcut,” she says, with finality. “Not in Bharatanatyam. Not in life. There is only shraddha, sadhana, and the slow becoming of grace.”
Read more:
- 20th Anniversary Of 'Saare Jahan Se Accha' Festival In Delhi Honours India’s Classical Dance Heritage and the Legacy of Guru Mayadhar Raut
- Padma Shri Malavika Sarukkai Celebrates 50 Years In Classical Dance And Choreography: “Bharatanatyam Became A Spiritual Quest”
- Kuchipudi Danseuse Shantha Ratii Preserves Indian Classical Tradition While Innovating On Foreign Soil
