Bridges – Class 11 English Chapter 27 Notes & NCERT PDF

About the Author

Kumudini Lakhia (born 1930) is a renowned Kathak dancer and choreographer, taught and influenced by Ram Gopal. She has performed in over 40 countries but gave up her solo career to start the Kadamb Dance Centre in Ahmedabad. She choreographed for the Hindi films Umrao Jaan and Sur Sangam. Her awards include the Sangeet Natak Akademi National Award (1982), the Padma Shri (1987) and the Nagar Bhushan from the city of Ahmedabad (on 50 years of Independence). In this autobiographical essay she shows the "bridges" between her life experiences and her work in dance.

Summary

1. "Born to live", not "born to dance"

She doubts dancers who claim they were "born to dance": "To dance means to struggle… discipline itself is a struggle. I believe I was not simply born to dance; I was born to live." Looking back, she sees "clear bridges between my life experiences and my work in dance."

2. A reluctant child

Dance was "forced upon me by a doting mother and a silent father". In Bombay, her mother took her by train, bus and on foot — about 45 minutes each way from Khar to Guru Sunder Prasad at Chowpatty — four days a week, waiting an hour in a not-so-clean ante-room. It began when, at seven, after seeing Mumtaz Ali (father of comedian Mehmood) dance in a film, she pranced around imitating him, and her mother said, "Kumudini, you are born to dance." She herself does not remember this.

3. Lessons from life — Liaquat Ali's guavas

Her father, an engineer, built army cantonments in Delhi, Naini and Allahabad during World War II. In Delhi, on Hardinge Avenue (now Tilak Marg), their neighbour was Liaquat Ali (later Prime Minister of Pakistan). His gardener caught her and her brother Suresh picking guavas; Liaquat Ali let them keep the fruit and invited them to come any time — but the mali's revengeful face kept them away. "It was one of my first lessons in the games that politicians play."

4. Boarding school in Lahore

At nine she was sent to Queen Mary's College (school) in Lahore — and her mother sent a dance teacher, Radhelal Misra (Sunder Prasad's nephew), too. She didn't enjoy class: her teacher "could not, or would not," explain why she was doing the movements. Her mother convinced the British principal that dance was "a form of prayer". She came to like British discipline: "Discipline in one's daily routine does bring discipline in thinking."

5. Her mother's death

Three weeks before her matriculation exams, the principal, Miss Cox, kindly told her to go home because her mother was ill. After 36 hours and three train-rides she found her mother already dead. She was 14. Confused, her hands hung loose, then clutched her stomach in hunger (she hadn't eaten for three days), but she hid it for fear of seeming greedy. "Even today I mistake the different kinds of hunger inside me." The confusion and the dangling arms entered her choreography.

Duvidha (Conflict): a middle-class woman chained to tradition (no sleeveless blouses, hair in a bun, serving her husband) sees through a window the newspaper image of a bold woman with a white streak in short hair, sleeveless blouse, widowed yet in colourful saris, who "commands a country" — and is torn between two lives, hungry for something she can't name.

6. "Where do I go from here?" — Atah Kim

After good exam results she was "at a crossroads", a question that became the piece Atah Kim — about the desire for power: once you possess it and reach your goal, "where do you go from there?" "It's a question without an answer but… the question must be asked." She compares memory to "pre-recorded cassettes" that fall into place when least expected.

7. Agriculture college — the body and religion

Her father said, "You have to do something that is off-beat." At 15 she joined an agriculture college at Naini, Allahabad — 29 boys and her. Boys deflated her bicycle tyres to walk back with her. When she wore shorts like the American professors, "58 eyes" stared. Her grandmother said girls must never push their chests out or uncover legs ("Don't argue"). Lakhia asks, "When will we understand the dignity of the female body?" — dancers must move with dignity. She questioned bargaining with God at temples; temples instead awaken all five senses (architecture, incense, bells, panchamrut, touch). These arguments taught her the difference between sensitivity and sentimentality, leading to the piece Panch Paras (the five senses).

8. Ram Gopal and the world

At 18, with an agriculture degree and few job prospects, she met Komlata Dutt (who had introduced Uday Shankar to Anna Pavlova in Paris) at a Bombay station; she invited her to join the Ram Gopal Dance Company in London. She learnt kummi (Kerala), ghumar (Rajasthan), dandia (Gujarat), and classical Bharatanatyam from Ram Gopal — a strict disciplinarian with "a fetish for perfection of line" — who said, "You've perfected the technique, now throw it overboard and dance." She passes this on: "before you begin experimenting, you need to perfect the technique." In post-war Germany, hungry children begging produced a different sensation than in India — teaching her the importance of context/placement, just as moving a piece on stage changes how it looks.

9. Home and family

After three years abroad she asked, "But where was home?" Friends from Lahore were now in Pakistan — "politics makes its presence felt even when uninvited." She married Rajanikant, a barrister (Lincoln's Inn) who trusted everyone and gave her a love of music; they had Shriraj and Maitreyi, who disagree on everything except their disapproval of her profession! Family life is like performing with others on stage: "You are no longer performing solo."

Themes

Literary Devices & Style

Word Power

Exam Focus

Q. What life lessons from her younger days did Kumudini carry into adult life?

Outline: politics' games (Liaquat Ali's guavas); discipline brings disciplined thinking (Lahore); Miss Cox's kind but firm demeanour; confusion and hunger after her mother's death; questioning tradition (grandmother); context changes meaning (Germany).

Q. What concepts did she represent through Duvidha, Atah Kim and Panch Paras?

Outline: Duvidha — conflict of a tradition-bound woman torn between two lives; Atah Kim — "where do I go from here?" and the desire for power; Panch Paras — the five senses, sensitivity vs sentimentality.

Q. How did Ram Gopal influence her?

Outline: strict discipline and perfection of line; Bharatanatyam and folk forms; "perfect the technique, then throw it overboard and dance" — which she teaches her students.

Common Mistakes