Bhopal: The work of making museum to preserve costumes, props, musical instruments of 65-year-old Rangshree Ballet Group, Bhopal has been put to hold for the past two years because lack of funds for building the infrastructure. A library and video library on art and culture was also planned but none of them could see the light of the day.
The troupe was formed by veteran choreographer Shanti Vardhan in 1952. The troupe’s first production was a dance-drama called ‘Ramayana’, built around a classical tale done by three dancers, a drummer and puppets. After the death of Shanti Vardhan in 1954, the group continued operations under the leadership of his wife Gul Vardhan but in 1964 it moved to Gwalior where it reemerged as the Rangshree Little Ballet Troupe.
In 1984, the troupe moved in Bhopal. Secretary of the troupe, Nirupama Joshi says, “It is still in our visualisation, not in tangible form due to lack of proper funds for building infrastructure and manpower. The projectis so big that it is not possible to build in a day. Recently, a meting was held on the matter and we are thinking to talk from some private institutions like AISECT and IGRMS. Still, we didn’t get grant for past two years. ” She further says, “But work of library is in process and we have collected around 3,000 books.
These books are based on art and culture as well as Hindi and English literature. It will also have script of some plays. And I am sure these rich collections may benefit to drama students, research scholars literature lovers. We also display some old musical instruments here. As we all know that the troupe is very old and we have huge collection of costumes, masks and props.Itis our heritage and we want to preserve but to display all these two to three thousands artefacts, we need proper space which we don’t have now. We are working in the direction but we can’t tell you exact date and time.”
