This year, Thane will be doing the Garba to RJ Malishka’s ‘Sonu’
The Navratri festival is a big event in Thane where somewhere there is Dandia and Garaba, or somewhere one can see ‘Bhondla’ of Maharashtra. One can also find, the Durga puja festival in some parts of the city.
Thane is all geared up to welcome Goddess Durga with ‘jagran’ and by playing Garba or Dandiya.
Times have changed and Navratri is now one of the biggest events of the year. Navratri mandals organise this event and invite people to play dandiya ras. There are prizes and awards and to win a competition one has to be very perfect. To be a perfect dancers many women and men as well do attend the classes to dance.
“Every year I have so many students men and women. I have students from 5 year to 60 years of age. I teach them traditional and the modern dance also. We have Indo-Western theme. To keep a tradition alive, we teach Garba and for modern look there are other forms of dances. HipHop and Salasa in garaba or dandia style. That is very popular and everybody enjoys it.” Said Vaishali Satra who herself had been titled as Garba queen.
Vaishali has her classes in Thane, Ghatkopar and Chembur. The trend of dandiya is ever changing. Every year a song becomes popular and its widely played in every nook and corner of the country. So this year it has been a ‘Sonu’ song. The song, where R.J Malishka had to face the BMC’s malaise. The ‘Sonu’ also has entered in Gujarati garba.
“The song is changed in Gujarati language and its very popular, so I have taught them steps on this song also. ‘Sonu’ is with beats now and everybody is enjoying it. Last year, we even danced on ‘Zingat’ (from Marathi movie ‘Sairat’.) Then we have ‘Shape of You’. The way songs keep changing, we adapt it and use it in the dance numbers.” added Vaishali.
There are many mandals in Thane which arrange dandiya and garba festival. The very famous Mandal in Thane is at Tembi naka where this year, the ace art director Nitin Desai is all set to create a decoration of ‘Jal Mahal’. 110 feet long, 60 feet wide, and 90 feet in height, this set is set to attract devotees as they will witness the magical creation of the director.