The I 'day Shankar India Cultural Centre at Almora started functioning in March 1940. Originally it was to have been called the All India Centre for Music and Dance. The Centre, although in India, was not exclusively Indian in thought or expression. It was a centre of culture, and not just a school of dance and music, an institution which would confer a rounded personality through dance, music and art.

The Almora Centre was C'dav Shankars dream and Kamala Chakravartv and her elder sister Lakshmi Shankar. who is now a well-known Hindustani musician, took part in this dream. At our request Mrs. Chakravartv recalled to Gown Ramnaravan her memories of Uday Shankar. I t was love at first sight lor my lather R.V. Sastri. when he saw Uday Shankar perlorm in 1939 at the Elphinstone Theatre in Madras. Shortly alter that he told us he was taking us to studv under the dancing celebrity. Mv sister Lakshmi. who had trained in Bharatanatvam under Kandappa Pillai. was then fifteen years old and I was twelve.

We were withdrawn Irom our Madras school. We journeyed across the subcontinent to Delhi. Lucknow and Kathgodam Irom where we took a bus to Almora. The passing scenery during this last stage might have been marvellous but, for me, the ride was a hideous experience. 1 reached Almora too sick to react to anything. Or so I felt till the moment Udav Shankar appeared to receive us. He was not handsome, nor had he classic features. But I could not take my eyes off the man who looked like a God. His charisma overwhelmed me. My lather left us there unde r mother's care. Mother was induced to take up the role of matron at the Girls* Hostel by Uday Shankar who would not allow anyone to waste even a single moment! 1 was shv and reserved and had no helpless; he worked himself up into despair, counting insults and grievances, real or imagined. He convinced himself that he did not belong; that he had outgrown his family. H e felt a stranger among his own people. H e wanted desperately to be alone, to shut himself U P H e wanted to justify his helplessness by making himself helpless. He began to dramatise the story of his isolation, his loneliness, others* neglect of him. In his delirium he wrenched himself away from his beloved Amala, their son Ananda and daughter Mamta, and took a separate apartment in Ballygunge. With him he took his loyal servant of many years, K.G. Menon, and his driver Jhagroo Ram. Now left to himself, he struggled to regain his composure.

He began hatching new schemes. Most of them were pipe-dreams, but he found something to cling to. H e wanted to teach. He wanted to start a production — any production. He wanted to dance — even if in the privacy of hisi room. But the doctors had forbidden over-exertion. He was obliged to rest most of the time, and to dream. His diet was severely restricted. It had to be bland and tasteless. Pills and potions became a daily routine. T h e last sparks of his creative genius were Samanya Kshati and Prakriti and Ananda, After that, from 1968 it was downhill all the way. Shankarscope was just a diversion, to humour himself, and to prove to himself that he was not totally lost. On March 11, 1972 he set up house separately.

To keep himself occupied, Shankar agreed to conduct dance and music classes at the [South Point School]. This was done with the help of his former musicdirector, Kamalesh Maitra. and by Shanti Bose, Anupama Das and Onkar Mullick, who had been dancers in his troupe. Th e arrangement continued for about two years. But in the meantime, Shankar grew increasingly helpless. With no resources of his own, he.decided to seek financial assistance. "Begging and borrowing to survive," as he put it. Several individuals and organisations came to his aid. He received more than he required but continued to be in need. H e could have returned to his family any time but, stubbornly, preferred to live by himself. He had come to love the torment he had forged for himself. He still had a circle, though very small, of visitors and friends. H e continued to bemoan his fate to all who were close to him or who, he thought, would sympathise with him. He continued to ask for money. And he got it in plenty. But he was never satisifed. Evidently, in this semi-dazed state, Shankar did not quite know what he was doing. He was easy to exploit, and undoubtedly was exploited. Poor Uday Shankar was a ruined man. Those who felt concerned about him still contrived to bring Uday Shankar substantial financial and other assistance.

Thus, he was appointed Producer Emeritus in the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, received a Senior Fellowship from the Department of Culture and a monthly stipend from the Shri Ram Foundation, New Delhi. Saurabh, an academy for music and dance in Calcutta, honoured Uday Shankar with the Bhuwalka award, which carried Rs. 10,000 with it, and the FIE Foundation in Maharashtra too gave an award, along with Rs. 10.000. Th e Prime Minister's Secretariat sent a donation. And other, sundry bits of help came Shankar's way. Ravi Shankar established a Shankar Foundation, in Calcutta, and funds from this too came substantially to I day Shankar's aid. But Uday Shankar always felt now that he was poor and in want. II only he had more financial security, he insisted; he could and would have done a great deal more for Indian dance. How much did he want-' A mere Rs.3,000 per month. So. on February 23, 1976, he put in his application, through the Rabindra Bharati. for a Nehru Fellowship.

This would have fetched him Rs.3,000 a month for two years plus Rs. 10,000 per year as contingency expenditure, and his purpose, his mission as he conceived it. would have been fulfilled. Or so he thought. T h e Nehru Fellowship is amongst the most prestigious awards or honours one can hope to win in India. Uday Shankar had set his heart on it, both for the money and security it would bring him, and for the honour. To support his case, he even wrote a letter to the Prime Minister. Indira Gandhi, in which he said: At the fag end of my'life after having three heart attacks, one with brain haemorrhage, I feel abdndoned not having the conditions necessary for leaving for posterity what is still pulsating in my brain. I wonder whether my past record in raising the image of my country abroad can entitle me to lav some claim on the country s generosity to enable me to live and work for the rest of my life in tolerable conditions. I feel that if Rs.3,000 per month are given to me and a place to work at, my contribution to the artistic life of India mav still not be negligible.

I am writing this to vou in view of the fact that like vour father, vou are a great patron of art and the creative life of India. Uday Shankar did not get the Nehru Fellowship; he sulked. He concluded that he was not wanted. India, for which he had striven so much, had betrayed him. He lamented and raved. H e did not understand that not all the will in the world, not all its riches, could galvanize him into action again. He was lost. But he would not see this. "Body and mind are one," he said. Uday Shankar said this over and over again. What he wanted to project and to survive when he was dead, was th£ oneness of body and mind.

That, he urged, was the whole core of his attitude to dance. Not many took him seriously. Nevertheless, in 1975 Uday Shankar was able to launch his long-standing 'body-and-mind' theme, at the Sri Aurobindo Institute of Culture, Tollygunge. He conducted the work, but it made no impact. Mavbe, if he had tried this ten years earlier, he could have achieved something. Now he was in a perpetual delirium. His glorious past, and his dim future — it all made no sense to him. T h e simple fact was that Uday Shankar now had no energy. The force, the driving power that had taken him to the top of the world in his dancing days was his phenomenal masculinity. With this gone, he became like a punctured balloon. Lifeless. No amount ol money, no adulation, no love or affection, no woman. could now have salvaged him. It was like Samson without the hair on his head.

Uday Shankar felt a loner, rejected. Others thought differently. H e was not forgotten. H e had received honours and awards all along. Th e last of these, in 1976, Desikottama — Honorary Doctorate in Literature - from Viswa Bharati, the University founded by Rabindranath Tagore. But Uday Shankar was not appeased and was not . impressed. H e expected far more from the countrv. and the people, for whom he had done SQ much, for whom he had sacrificed his all, including his health. Awards, degrees, doctorates amused him. They were jokes, he insisted. All that they did was remind him of what he had been, not of what he could be. 3$ Uday Shankar. conqueror of the dance world. continued to sulk in his tenth floor flat in Ballygunge. T h e only link he retained with Amala was an exchange of greetings on the telephone on their birthdays and wedding anniversary.

She had to take the initiative always. The last of these calls was on March 8, 1977. their wedding anniversary. "How are you," she asked. "So-so. Okay," he replied. "And how are you:'" "I am well. I only wanted to tell you that in every single birth I'll be your wife." "Thank you." Uday Shankar alone was Uday Shankar bored. The realisation dawned suddenly and. on an impulse, the West Bengal Government, through Buddhadev Bhattacharjee, Minister lor Information and Cultural Affairs, came to the rescue. Uday Shankar was presented a television set in June 1977. three months before he died, on September 26, 1977. September had always been a crucial month. It was in September 192!5 that he took his first step us a professional dancer, in Anna Pavlova's Company.

In September 1975 he suddenly got critically ill and was admitted to the SSKM Hospital, on State expense. In September 1976 he was admitted to the Belle Vue Clinic, again seriously ill. And in September 1977 — on the 11th, to be precise, he was admitted to the Calcutta Medical Research Institute, also known as the Calcutta Hospital, to Cabin No.715 and subsequently to Bed No.5 in the Intensive Cardiac Care Unit, under Dr. Y.K. Kejriwal. His condition continued to cause alarm.

Uday Shankar was an institution and in a fit of concern, a medical team was set up by the West Bengal Government to keep track of his progress. The team consisted of the top specialists, Dr. J.C. Banerjee, Dr. Rathin Roy. Dr. M.K. Chhetry, Dr. C.C. Kar and Dr. Ekan Ghosh. Ravi Shankar telephoned from London every night to knoV of his brother's progress. In fact, Uday Shankar received the best available medical attention. When his condition worsened, the Health Minister, Nani Bhattacharya and the Minister for Higher Education, Sambhu Ghosh, stepped in to ensure that nothing was lacking. It was all of no avail. No avail at all. Uday Shankar died at 6.10 on the morning ol Monday. September 26. 1977.

T h e previous night, he cried repetitively: "Robu ke dako, Robu ke dako. Call Robu, call Robu." Apparently he wanted to share some thoughts, or to be just close to Ravi Shankar, his youngest brother. T h e hospital authorities, on the directive of B.M. Birla, one of the founder directors, waived all expenses incurred by Uday Shankar's prolonged stay and treatment. T h e body that had for years pulsated and throbbed on the stage as Krishna, Shiva, Kartikeya, Indra, Gandharva, Arjuna, Buddha, now lay inert, and was taken charge of by the West Bengal Government. Uday Shankar belonged to them, to Bengal. All State Government offices in Calcutta were closed after 3 P.M. T h e body lay in the foyer of Rabindra Sadan, the prestigious theatre in Calcutta, till 9 a.m. on Tuesday. Uday Shankar's death made headline news. All India Radio repeated the news in its morning, lunch-hour and night broadcasts*. T h e nightly nation-wide hook-up 'Spotlight' was devoted to a tribute to Uday Shankar, by Mohan Khokar.

Next day, Uday Shankar's body was taken on a token, sentimental visit to Rabindra Bharati, and from there in a winding procession to the Keortala cremation ground. All expenses on the funeral were borne by the State Government. Uday Shankar, torxh-bearer of the Indian dance revival was gone. Th e obituaries recorded that he was the first to be honoured with the Award for Creative Dance by the Sangeet Natak Akademi, New Delhi, and was later elected a Fellow; that he was made Padma Vibhushan, a title bestowed by the President of India, in 1971, that... Out of the limelight, Uday Shankar had been forgotten by the people of his country after his return from a fateful American tour in 1968. On September 26 and 27, 1977, he suddenly became a national hero, his name on everyone's lips. T h e following day, he was forgotten again. [From the book, "His Dance, His Life: A Portrait of Uday Shankar," by Mohan Khokar. Reproduced with permission).