Economist Turned Dancer, Debapriya Das Is Giving Belly Dance The Stage It Deserves

Debapriya Das' dance journey started when she was eight years old. Das, who always had a natural inclination towards movement in general, enrolled in Bharatnatyam classes and trained rigorously till she was 18. At 22, when she returned to dancing after finishing university studies, she enrolled herself in Bharatanatyam, ballet, contemporary dance and belly dance. While she practised all forms alongside working a job in Bengaluru, belly dancing became a constant for her.

By the time Das turned 25, she started getting opportunities to perform. "The thought of pursuing it full-time was definitely scary because I didn't have anyone who could guide me into the world of arts. Therefore, I took a few years to plan out my savings and my dance education. I finally made a call to shift my career from an economist to a full-time dancer when I was 27." For Das, the 'calling' was perhaps always there, but it was thorough planning and support from her family that helped her make the shift. 

In an interview with SheThePeople, Debapriya Das talks about her shift from being an economist to becoming a full-time dancer, establishing a platform called Nrityakosh, belly dancing in India, her growth as an artist and the challenges that drive her artistry.  

What were the initial challenges while finding your ground in the field?

Raised in a liberal middle-class Bengali family, my parents had instilled the importance of financial independence from a very young age. Following that path, as a young adult, one of my main motivations was to get a job as early as possible. I did achieve it right out of university. It was comfortable and I felt life was finally happening. However, the decision to pursue dance and change my career was intimidating. The biggest challenge was how to handle the financial instability. I am also the first woman in my family to pursue arts full-time and be an entrepreneur. The challenge of having no one to guide you in this field which sometimes is quite unstructured can be daunting and demotivating. 

Once you decide to follow this dream, finding a community where you can work is also very challenging. The belly dance industry is quite porous, by that I mean entry to the industry as a teacher or a dancer isn't restricted and anyone can do it. However, that being said, it literally has a hand-to-mouth existence in terms of getting gigs or getting enough students to sustain a livelihood. 

What led you to start Nrityakosh? As an artist establishing one’s platform in India sure must have its own set of challenges and learnings. 

The need for a community that can help you and trust your work is very important. When I started belly dancing I was looking for this community, the inability to find one was demotivating but I believed that I could perhaps change this structure. I was looking for an inclusive space or community which could help me pursue belly dancing professionally and not just as a hobby. With this intention, I started Nrityakosh.

I wanted to present belly dance - oriental dance, to the Indian audiences in a manner they can relate to without changing the true spirit of the dance and its culture. I started Nrityakosh - House of Classical & Contemporary Belly Dance in 2017, with these two intentions. I began with seven students. 

I introduced Middle Eastern folk dance training, something that was not a thing to learn in Bengaluru because of its very nuanced nature. Initially, it was difficult to get students on board since most students come with a very set understanding of what belly dance is and why they want to learn it. To undo that and take them through a different course was difficult. However with time and with a persistent mindset of learning the art form and its culture respectfully has paid off. Today, we have three main branches in Bengaluru and about 200 active student enrollments. In 2021, I established 'The Nrityakosh Company' - the professional wing at Nrityakosh. It's a ten-member team, where all are mentored by me and are dance professionals or actively seeking to become one. Today, they have a community, an inclusive space and opportunities to take up oriental dance as a profession and also make a good living out of it. 

You’ve been at the forefront of the belly dance movement since 2017. How did the dance form inspire you to the extent that it’s now become a revolution on its own for several dancers at Nrityakosh too? 

When I started belly dancing in 2012, it was promoted mostly as a fitness format or a great weekend hobby. All that was great for that time, however, as I started learning more, I realised that the extent of learning was very limited in the city. There was something that the dance invoked in me, its beauty, its empowering nature and also the need to learn more and really understand the dance to its deepest core - I guess the researcher in me was intrigued and I started finding avenues to learn the art form in its truest form. 

In 2015, I got an opportunity to train with the late Hossam Ramzy, he was one of the most celebrated Egyptian percussionists of his generation. I travelled to Italy to learn Middle Eastern music and dance from him and his then-wife Serena Ramzy. This was a big investment for me at that time and a part of me was very apprehensive since I wasn't sure if belly dancing was something that I wanted to pursue. But, thankfully, my instincts won, I did the training and it changed my entire narrative about belly dancing. This was one of my biggest milestones, sharing my training days with Sir Hossam Ramzy changed everything for me. 

This was the first time I realised belly dance was a cultural dance. I was inspired by its traditions, socio-politics, and world influences and I carry that inspiration even today. I found a window where I was able to learn about a completely different culture than ours, understand how our colonial pasts left an impact on us and other different cultures, learn about traditions and most importantly learn about how art transcends boundaries.

Belly dance is essentially an umbrella term for many traditional and classical dance formats which draw inspiration from North Africa and the Middle East. It truly is one of the rare art forms which cuts across so many countries.

Could you share more about the research areas that held your interest when you worked as an economist?

I graduated with a master's in Economics and started working at a Thinktank in Bengaluru. I loved my work there, my primary interests were in the field of climate change adaptations, poverty alleviation and aspects of development economics. I worked on several projects related to these topics for five years.

Many like to think that career change happens when one isn't happy with the existing one. Mine wasn't that and perhaps because of this, I took a long time to make a shift.

Belly dance was adjudicated as a recreation in India for the longest time rather than a professional form of art. We’ve seen tremendous changes in the past two decades, especially through the digital realm with respect to how dance forms are seen and the outreach they have. How has the digital landscape helped you and the artists you’ve met in this regard?

To be honest, social media is both a boon and a bane in this case as it is in most cases. With social media, people are seeing more belly dancers, they are also in a position to see more traditional formats of dance styles. It has become more accessible, and the consumption of 'belly dance' as a commodity has increased immensely. 

I have met many dancers doing incredible work around the globe via Instagram. Therefore most certainly the reach is immense. Having said that, the easy access has also led to many “Instagram belly dancers”. And, once again, this is a free space and everyone makes something out of it, which is absolutely great. Social media has given opportunities to many dancers to establish themselves in the digital industry which can otherwise be very difficult to manoeuvre. However, it does come at the cost of once again making the dance look a certain way. Pop culture has done it several times, and continues to do it and the immense popularity of belly dance is also an outcome of it. Similarly, social media follows the same trend, in all of this I anticipate that we often forget that dance is a cultural & a traditional format.

What is that one thing you’d like for Indian society to change to wholly accept and respect both artists and art forms? 

I would say giving young adults the option and the choice of pursuing fine arts or movement arts like everything else. For example, in schools, there are sessions on career counselling. Students are made aware of how to follow a certain path, be it engineering, medicine, sciences or any other profession for that manner. But when it comes to pursuing fine arts or visual arts, it's a challenge. And if it is a nuanced art form like belly dance, then it's all the more difficult. Things are definitely changing, I see more courses offered by national universities on fine arts and movements arts, which I suppose is a positive change. 

I would like to mention another point, funding and support to artists is also something that needs to actively come from our society as a whole. It's true when our previous generation would say “What would you do pursuing the arts, how will you earn’? It is immensely difficult for an individual from a humble economic background to pursue arts, studying is expensive with more than a fifty percent probability of not getting financial returns. This is a structural problem, arts cannot be isolated from society and, therefore, as a community and as a society, we need to support artists and art forms. 

From when you started to now, what has impacted your growth most as an artist?

The primary stimulus for my growth has been the inclination to keep studying. I have kept studying and I continue to do so. I started travelling in 2015 to various countries to learn about Middle Eastern music, dance, and culture. I have continued that, every summer I tour for performances, workshops and my own personal learnings with my teachers. 

Other than being a student forever, it is also the kind of work I have done with Nrityakosh over the last six years. As an institute, we foster inclusivity by offering bellydance as an educational & recreational program for individuals of all ages and genders, creating a space for learning and growth. We are also actively involved in empowering young dance professionals who want to explore and embrace professional opportunities in belly dancing in India, where it is not just a hobby but a potential career path. 

Please tell me a little about Nrityakosh’s Parikrama and The Arabian Nights projects.

Our most recent and upcoming work is Parikrama - The Oriental Journey. This was presented by The Nrtiyakosh Company at Shoonya Space, Bengaluru in September 2023. Parikrama is a lecture demonstration and performance where we brought ten Middle Eastern dance styles & took the audiences through the history, culture and socio-politics of the art form. 

The Arabian Nights is an upcoming production set to take place on October 14 at JSS Auditorium. We're bringing a dance retelling of 1001 Nights, spotlighting the women of these popular stories and offering fresh perspectives to these immensely popular narratives. The dance production navigates through stories of Badr-Al-Badour AKA Jasmine, Morgiana, Sindbad and Scheherazade - the narrator of the very popular 1001 Nights. 

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