My experience with SPIC-MACAY

Over fifteen years ago, while I was a student, I had the good fortune to work for a unique voluntary organization called SPIC-MACAY. While there were the customary ups and downs that we had to deal with, it turned out to be a worthwhile experience at the end of it all. SPIC-MACAY stands for the “Society for the Promotion of Indian Classical Music and Culture Amongst Youth”. While I agree that it is a mouthful of a name, there cannot be a more precise name to it, as the name is the exact mission of this little known organization. I call it “little-known” because many people wouldn’t have heard of it until and unless you had an interest in Indian classical music and dance forms while you were in school or college and if you were fortunate enough to have been a student in one of those locations where SPIC-MACAY is active. SPIC-MACAY was founded by… hold your breath for this one… none other than IIT-ians and, for the most part, is based out of IIT Delhi. And most of its active members at various chapters (all over India and abroad) hail from engineering and medical colleges. As one would expect, the chapters themselves are active at almost all the professional colleges/universities of India, and through their activities, bring in the surrounding educational entities into their fold.

One might question the reasoning behind the willingness of students from professional fields to dedicate their valuable time to the pursuit of the promotion of our art forms, that too when they know up front that there are not many takers in today’s day and age. Well, the reasons are truly manifold and I shall try to spell out some of them by drawing on personal experience. We people in professional fields like to take up a challenge when we see it, and if it is for a good cause, all the more better! In my case, barring the occasional ‘Sankarabharanam’ on the silver screen, I could not boast of any great exposure to the Indian art forms. My thinking at that stage was: why not give it a shot and see if I can learn something about our great art forms from the maestros themselves? If we would like to learn from our experiences and what better place to learn than a voluntary organization like SPIC-MACAY, where, on a daily basis, we will have to learn to deal with each other’s egos, we will have to learn to deal with the government of the day, interact with students and heads of institutions trying to convince them of the need to expose their students to Indian cultural forms, interact with the champions of society, organize free events (featuring the greats of our land) for students, and last but not the least making sure that the artists have nothing to complain about while they are under our care. All this, while expecting nothing in return but the hope that our efforts of exposing Indian music and dance to children will one day create an interest in today’s children for these ancient, rich art forms. Of course, there is the added pleasure of being able to interact with some of the great artists of our times. At the end of this all, we would have learnt something about organizational and communication skills. The interaction with the likes of great stalwarts like Ustad Bismillah Khan and Pandit CR Vyas is a humbling experience to say the least. One can never fathom how down to earth these individuals are and how they can come down to our small minds just to interact with us!

My first foray into SPIC-MACAY was when we hosted Sudharani Raghupati (Bharatanatyam) in Vizag. It was at this one (primary/middle for those in the west) school that we had an evening program scheduled for where the target audience was in the age group of maybe 5 to 15, with most of them having negligible previous exposure to classical dance. We were wondering how Sudharani would be able to get at least a few them interested in Bharatanatyam. We didn’t have to wait long as when Sudharani appeared on the modest “stage” (if we may call it that), there was nothing but silence. To communicate, Sudharani went down to the child’s level of understanding and how! She started off with the customary salutation and before long, she started off by explaining the rationale behind how some of the basic human expressions like happiness, anger, jealousy, lust, confusion, irritation, shyness, desperation etc. are depicted in Bharatanatyam. She not only performed and explained them one by one, but she also drew them up for the whole group to see. She basically made it an interactive experience, so much so that the children were thrilled with the performance. What turned out to be a confused group at the beginning of the performance became an enthralled and enlightened group within an hour. There was no stopping the children after it was over. Before the performance, they were told that she was a great dancer, but after the performance, they recognized her as one. They had lots of questions to ask of her. They dished out anything they could find, just to get an autograph of a great dancer and a great instructor. Sudharani herself was very exhausted after the con cert, but with a smile on her face, she acknowledged that she had had a great time. That was my first ever up-close encounter with an Indian art form and I was certainly hooked onto the mission of SPIC-MACAY from that day on.

I still remember the evening when we walked the 2 Km odd stretch from the university to the beach along with Pandit CR Vyas and his group. In spite of his age, he insisted that he would walk to the beach and took to the road with a few of us for company. The walk turned out to be great, as we reached the beach just before sunset. If you ever walked at least a kilometer towards Vizag beach, you would realize that as you walk towards it, you almost always end up walking downhill as you approach the shore. This presents you with a changing view of the sea (in daytime or on a moonlit night) as you descend towards it. Add to this the colors of the setting sun interacting with those of the sea and you are in for a visual treat! The breeze also changes angles on you as you approach the shore. Panditji was so overwhelmed with the view that he couldn’t help but mention it to us. Once we took up position on the sea wall that runs along the beach road, Panditji just sat down in silence for a few moments as if to take in the calming effect of the elements. It looked like he was at peace with himself. After a while, he resorted to small chitchat with the rest of us and then, after the night took over and as the moonlight played with the waves, Panditji broke into song out of the blue! It was a moment that I will cherish forever, for at that time, all banter stopped and everybody was, well, just listening to him. At that moment, I understood his deep passion for the music he sings and that he enjoyed every bit of what he was doing. After a few more minutes by the beach, we started trekking back to Panditji’s quarters for the night. Panditji insisted that he walk back in spite of it being an uphill task (for all of us) now.

My experience with SPIC-MACAY was a deeply educational one too. This is where I made new friends from across India who shared more or less the same goals and expectations that I had, folks who had the fire within them to do something about fostering our culture among fellow students as well as to the next generations. Our weekly chapter meetings were times when we interacted with locally re-known personalities and found out more about the passion and energy that drives such great souls. Whatever we did, the objective was always to learn something in the process, from each other, from famous people, from the great artists, from the younger generation, from peers, from the older ones. If not anything else, this experience has strengthened my desire for continuous learning. As far as Music and Dance is concerned, this has been my best exposure to one of the finest art forms that the world can boast of today.