Talented dancer Sahana to perform in India

A TALENTED RGS dancer will travel to India to showcase her skills at a prestigious performing arts centre.

Sahana Karthikeyan, whose family are originally from Chennai, in Tamil Nadu, was inspired by her older cousins to leap into the world of classical dance.

She will perform the highly skilled and intricate salangai pooja dance, lasting one-and-a-half hours, in front of an audience of 250 people at the Rasika Ranjani Sabha auditorium.

The performance, on August 17, will include the blessing of ankle bells, an essential component of the Bharatanatyam, one of the oldest and most difficult Indian classical dances.

Sahana started learning Bharatanatyam, which reflects South Indian traditions and values, at the age of seven, originally training under the renowned guru Chamundeswari Pani, whose North-East dance school acts as a cultural link keeping Indian culture and traditional dance alive in younger generations.

When her family moved from Yarm to Ripon, Sahana continued to pursue her dance online, under guidance of her current guru, Dr Deeptha Rubasundaram, a multi-talented classical artist who arranged for her to perform in India in August.

Now 12 years old, Sahana has experience of dancing at several high-profile events, including in front of the Mayor of Middlesbrough at temple festivals and solo in Madurai, India in December.

More recently, she performed solo at an Indian harvest festival event in Leeds in front of 200 people and show-cased her solo performance at a multicultural event in Darlington in June.

Sahana, who also loves singing and playing cricket, aims to master the art of traditional dance so that, one day, she can pass on her skills to future generations.