Bala Devi Chandrasekhar recreates the pilgrimage to Pandharpur in her thematic work

Bharatanatyam exponent Bala Devi Chandrashekar’s thematic production, ‘Mauli: A Timeless Tradition’, presented recently at Kalakshetra, was more a spiritual pilgrimage through Maharashtra’s 800-year-old Varkari tradition than a conventional dance performance. Conceived as an ekaharya (solo) production in the bhanika style, it took the audience on a virtual journey from Alandi and Dehu to Pandharpur.

Rather than following a linear narrative, the production unfolded in four acts, each illuminating a different facet of bhakti. Bala Devi’s premise was clear from the outset — true devotion is not measured by ritual or scholarship, but by compassion. Drawing on the lives of saint-poets such as Gnaneshwar, Namdev, Janabai, Tukaram and Eknath, she explored how ordinary acts of kindness can become expressions of the divine, thus making the production as much a reflection on humanity as on spirituality.