Odishi Dance

Odissi dance is one of the earlier form of Indian classical dance. This dance has been protected in the temple and caves of Orissa for several centuerias. Recently it has been exposed the people of the whole country and in the foreing countries also. It has originated from the Devadasi of the temple of the jagannath. The main characteristics of Odissi dance are its sensuousness and Lyrical qualities. It is simple, vigorous and straight forward. In Odissi dance there is and expression of devotion. In the dance the body lines are shown rounded. In Odissi dance there are nine ‘rasas” in all total. But much emphasis is given on the “sringara” and “Bhakti” aspects since they are comparatively more visual and heart touching. Inspire of the above, it has been taken a lot of time to convince the Central Dance and Darama Academy that the Odissi dance is a separate form of making Odissi dance what it is today are Kelu Charan Mahapatra, Pankaja Charan Das, Deba Prasad Das, Gangadhar Pradhan, Ramani Ranjan Jena and Raghunath Dutta. Among eminent Odissi dancers who have won worldwide reputation the name of Smt.Sanjukta Panigrahi, Dr. Minati Mishra, Kumkum Mohanty, Sonal Mansingh and Indrani Raheman are worth mentioning.