“Nature
is painting for us, day after day, pictures of infinite beauty.”-
John Ruskin
On
the 4th day of Onam, a popular harvest festival in Kerala,
the Swaraj Round of Thrissur town comes alive with tigers. Yes
tigers, you heard it right! Vibrant, snarling tigers come in hundreds
and take on the streets of Thrissur with an air of wild enthusiasm.
This practice of men dressing up as tigers and dancing on the streets
with great pomp and show is called pulikali – ‘puli’ stands for
tiger and ‘kali’ stands for play.
 |
| Pulikali In Thrissur |
Pulikali
is a unique dance and art form seen only in Thrissur, and some parts
of Palakkad. It is a 200 year old tradition which started in the time
of Maharaja Rama Varma (Sakthan Thampuran). It was conceived as a
part of the Onam celebrations, to honour the deep relationship
between man and animal, and uphold the wild side of man.
 |
| Women Tigers |
Traditionally
this wild and wild dance form has been performed only by men, but
2016 saw the first women tigers taking part in the dance. Here
dancers paint their bodies with life-like images of the tiger in
colourful stripes of red, yellow and black, and don a tiger mask with
artificial teeth and tongue to replicate the body of a real tiger.
Men with large pot-bellies are preferred for this dance, as it is
easier to create the elaborate painting of the tiger face on a pot
belly, with a 3-D effect. Also the dance steps need the belly to
shake and bounce, which is more pronounced for the rounded belly. The
dance moves are inspired by the movement of the tiger, and the play
revolves around the tigers trying to evade a game-hunter with a gun.
The
event is a competition involving several groups which try to vie each
other to make the best floats which are based on some relevant theme,
and the best dressed tigers dancing to the tune of traditional
instruments like Chenda, Udukku and Thakil. Each group takes their
floats and dancing tigers in a procession through the different roads
of Thrissur, finally entering the Swaraj Round.
 |
| Body Painting |
The
preparations for pulikali start in the wee hours of the morning. The
body painting procedure is a highly painstaking process. A base coat
of paint is first painted after removing all the hair on the body
parts which need to be painted, and allowed to dry for around 3
hours. Next the more intricate painting with details of stripes,
tiger face etc is done. The entire process takes some 5-7 hours. The
tigers start to enter the streets in a procession by noon, and reach
Swaraj Round by evening. A thronging crowd cheers the tigers as they
dance in full vigour and abandon, and some spectators even join the
dance.
Pulikali
celebrates the wild creations of nature, and the indispensable
animal-human connection. It is a reminder that man needs to honour
nature in all activities. The “play of the tiger” is a symbol of
co-existing with nature in harmony, and is an event worth watching in
the Onam month (August-September).
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