Kolkata Sanved uses dance movement as a therapeutic tool for patients
living with mental illness. Dance has given them happiness, a sense
of rhythm and a new hope, writes Shoma A. Chatterji

DANCE is a liberating experience. It turns the body into a creative channel of ideas, expressions, emotions, feelings, rhythms, shape, energy and direction. It is only natural that movements empower and celebrate, says Sohini Chakraborty, founder-director, Kolkata Sanved. Kolkata Sanved is a West Bengal-based NGO that, over time, has evolved into a pioneering institution in using dance movement as a therapeutic tool for the vulnerable and the underprivileged. It initiated a pilot programme in two governmental mental health hospitals in Kolkata in collaboration with a human rights organisation called Anjali.

Kolkata Sanved recently conducted a study to evaluate the impact of the dance movement therapy on the lives of patients who were participants in the programme. "Kolkata Sanved began as an experiment within a shelter home for victims rescued from trafficking and sexual abuse. This led to the establishment of dance therapy as an alternate psychotherapeutic form, now adopted by over 30 partner organisations in India, Bangladesh and Nepal. Our sampoornata curriculum includes processes that enable individuals to come to terms with their situation and their bodies. We have worked directly with 2,500 individuals, and have had an impact on not less than 5,000 people," she adds.

Kolkata Sanved recently released an evaluation report of its unique project of DMT with 27 participants comprising eight women and 19 men living with different kind of mental illness. Their disorders include schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, major depression and other severe and persistent disorders. The best feature of this project is that most of the Kolkata Samved trainers have themselves gone through DMT in the past as girls rescued from trafficking, or girls who are physically challenged, or having come from broken homes burdened by poverty, and so on.

The participants were involved in the programme within a timeframe ranging between six months and two years. They were in-patients of the two hospitals for an average period of four years beginning from one year to 14 years. "We were surprised to discover that though many who were near-normal and were prepared to get back to their families, but the families were not prepared to take them back. Reasons given by the families for not taking them back varied from fear of relapse, consequent difficulties in getting them re-admitted to the hospitals, considering that this called for a court order, etc. The most tragic part is that the families were unwilling to take on the responsibility of a non-contributing family member," explains Chakraborty. Most of them have their root families in Kolkata, while some have come from villages within the state.

One of the trainers said: "While I was selecting dancers for a programme, one of the patients asked me why I had not chosen her. I had no answer and she stopped attending my class. I later realised that it would be best to allow them to decide whether they would like to participate in a programme or not, and things improved considerably." Another trainer said that the training sessions taught her more than she taught them. "These classes helped me place my personal grief and anxieties in perspective and made me realise that my problems are nothing compared to what the patients experience," she said. "This was the first time that we, as trainers of Kolkata Sanved, were stepping into a different experience altogether. Earlier, our work was with children from shelter homes, distanced from working with mentally ill people. I was relieved when the first class was over. When I walked out of the hospital gates, I felt as if I had escaped. But slowly, it became a positive relationship, and we realised that unlike the high energy of children we had worked with, this was a group that got tired easily and forgot quickly, daily medication being one of the reasons," says Kolkata Sanved trainer Nipuna.

Almost all participants were open to the idea of dancing, though most of them did not have any formal experience in dance. Some of the men said that the only time they danced was during the procession preceding the immersion of Goddess Durga. "I used to dance during Saraswati Puja," said one, while another said: "I would dance in front of the mirror at home. I did not feel awkward while dancing". All of them were enthusiastic about the programme after they heard how the programme would function and what DMT classes would teach them. Though some of the girls and women came from conventional families where free mingling with members of the opposite sex was not the practice, they had no hesitation in dancing in a mixed group. When asked whether she was enjoying DMT classes, one woman said: "I used to watch Hindi films and watched a lot of dancing. Moreover, I had fallen in love and that made me like dancing all the more."

The dance style the facilitators and trainers of Kolkata Sanved follow is a free-flowing modern Indian style with an emphasis on spontaneous movement. "Our trainers have drawn on the therapeutic elements present in Indian dance forms to create a unique and holistic approach for dealing with psychological issues of trauma. They have taken some footwork from Kathak to trigger the release of anger, some bodily postures from Bharatanatyam to rethink the image of the body and its relation to space, and most importantly, stress on the importance of team work through incorporation of folk dance forms," says Chakraborty.

By the same logic, hand gestures are used as tools for story telling, while facial expressions open a window to human emotions. There is nothing like a ‘wrong step’ or the ‘right step’ because the participants are trained to create movements that are actually their responses to experience. Flexibility of the body, limbs and face are given free play. After initial training, the participants are asked to act out their own stories through dance movements and express their unspoken emotions.

What did the participants feel at the end of the training? One male participant said: "Both dance and yoga help you to stay fit. But dance is accompanied by music and that is how it is different from yoga. To dance you need an orchestra (begins to sing loudly). Dance is coupled with music."

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