Chhau Masked Dance Purulia West Bengal

Purulia Chhau is one of three regional variants of the Chhau dance form of eastern India, performed primarily in Purulia district of West Bengal, Seraikela in Jharkhand, and Mayurbhanj in Odisha, combining martial arts, folk acrobatics, and mythology in a vigorous outdoor performance using large painted papier-mache masks depicting deities, demons, and animals, performed over multiple nights during the spring Chaitra Parva festival. The Purulia variety is the most spectacular for its mask tradition, with masks up to three feet tall representing Durga with ten arms, the demon Mahishasura, Ganesha, and other characters, made by specialist Kshatriya (Sutradhara) families in Charida village of Purulia district which has become known as Chhau mask village with over 500 mask-making artisan families. The performance combines vigorous athletic jumping and spinning sequences with precise gesture sequences enacting episodes from the Mahabharata and Ramayana. UNESCO inscribed Chhau on the Representative List of Intangible Cultural Heritage in 2010. Charida village, where Chhau mask artisans produce thousands of masks annually for performance and export tourist market, is a UNESCO recognized craft village and craft tourism destination. The training of Chhau dancers begins in childhood with martial arts conditioning including high leaps, splits, and spinning.