Shyama

Season's Greetings from Shyama

Season's greetings from Santiniketan, home town of Shyama's creator, Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore. This is where Shyama was filmed and where almost all of its cast and crew are based. It is the third day of the annual 'Poush Mela' [winter fair], for which tens of thousands of people descend on this normally calm university town. The Mela is also an opportunity for former students to be reunited with their contemporaries, many of whom return to Santiniketan for this three-/four-day, outdoor fair.

The Mela stalls offer mainly arts and crafts from the region around Santiniketan, as well as from other Indian States. This year, there are also a few stalls in the field where the original Mela used to be held, a short distance from the crush and bustle of the main Mela. The stalls here include those of book publishers and other arts and crafts more closely associated with Tagore and Santiniketan.

One of the stalls, known as 'Chaander Haat' (literally, 'The market of the moon'), has been providing a forum for Tagore songs and dance. Organised by Santiniketan- & Paris-based musicologist Sharmila Roy Pommot, it has attracted many eminent Tagore performers and scholars. Shyama producer and star Kaberi Chatterjee gave a lecture demonstration yesterday on Tagore dance musicals, of which Shyama was the third and last. Extracts from her presentation will be included in the Shyama podcast, for which we are currently filming background material.