Chhau Dance
Seraikella is a large village in the state of Bihar that is on the Northeast of India. It is here
where the Chhau dance originated from a martial art form which is called Pari-Khanda (Pari
means shield and Khanda means Sword) used to defend the village thousands of years ago. It
was the responsibility of the king of the village to preserve the dance form and even today, the
royal family share a great interest in the dance. The festival of Seraikella is a week long festival
in the first week of April every year where all the people of the village join in to perform the
rituals which is then followed by the Chhau dance.
Chhau has been sadly under represented in the literature, which is surprising since in many
ways it is a unique Indian dance. The dance seems independent of caste. It is the only masked
dance in India and there are suggestions that the masked dances of Bali might have evolved
from Chhau from the ancient times when Orissa ruled Bali. Moreover the origin from the
martial art can still be seen in training exercises that use a shield and sword.
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