Mumbai : At a glittering Sangit Kala Kendra Awards function held in Mumbai on the 19thof November 2022, the coveted Aditya Vikram Birla Kalashikhar Puraskar, its highest award was conferred upon the legendary dancer Dr. Vyjayanthimala Bali by Mrs. Rajashree Birla, President of the Sangit Kala Kendra (SKK).The SKK Awards instituted in 1996 in memory of its iconic founder the late Mr. Aditya Vikram Birla, are a way of perpetuating his rich legacy in the domain of performing arts.
Alongside, two maestros in the making Ms. AnwesaMahanta, the well-knownSattriya dancer, and Mr. KalamandalamAdithyan of Kathakali fame, were honoured with the Aditya Vikram Birla Kalakiran Puraskars.
The SKK Awards jury comprised of the virtuosi cohort:Dr Kanak Rele, Smt. Chitra Visweswaran, Smt. DarshanaJhaveri and Shri Jayant Kastuar.
Addressing the august gathering, Mrs. Birla recounted some of the unique qualities of SKK’s founding father Mr. Aditya Vikram Birla. In her words so profoundly spoken, “Adityaji had an amazingly positive outlook on life. He said, to live life, you have to love life. One must be happy. Beyond family, beyond work, the performing arts, like music, dance, theater, help shape, the contours of happiness in one’s map of life. And this stoked his passion for performing arts, which in turn birthed the Sangit Kala Kendra”.
Showering accolades upon Ms. Vyjayanthimala Bali, Mrs. Birla averred, “Vyjayanthimalaji is not only the doyen of dance, the unmatchable dancer at the top, but a versatile actress, and a multifaceted persona. Imagine, way back in 1940, as a child of 7, she performed a classical Indian dance, for Pope Pius XII at the Vatican City”.
Walking down memory lane and given that dance was the center point of the awards, she shared that, both she and the late Mr. Aditya Birla felt, that dance cuts across time and space, dance is actually dreams taking flight. In dance they experienced a restorative, rebuilding creative art.
In a lighter vein, Mrs. Birla mentioned that even as they enjoyed watching dance performances, Mr. Birla never danced because he joked that he had two left feet.
Between 1998 and 2018, the recipients of the Kalashikhar Puraskar were Guru KeluCharan Mohapatra (1998), Mrs. Mrinalini Sarabhai (2007), Pt. BirjuMaharaj (2014) and Dr. Kanak Rele (2018).
The Awards were followed by a high octane dose of entertainment by Ms. Madhuri Dixit and Mr. Arijit Singh.
