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06/03/24 10:40 AM IST

GI tag for Majuli masks of Assam

In News
  • The traditional Majuli masks in Assam were given a Geographical Indication (GI) tag by the Centre.
  • Majuli manuscript painting also got the GI label.
About Masks
  • The handmade masks are traditionally used to depict characters in bhaonas, or theatrical performances with devotional messages under the neo-Vaishnavite tradition, introduced by the 15th-16th century reformer saint Srimanta Sankardeva.
  • The masks can depict gods, goddesses, demons, animals and birds — Ravana, Garuda, Narasimha, Hanuman, Varaha Surpanakha all feature among the masks.
  • They can range in size from those covering just the face (mukh mukha), which take around five days to make, to those covering the whole head and body of the performer (cho mukha), which can take up to one-and-a-half months to make.
  • The masks are made of bamboo, clay, dung, cloth, cotton, wood and other materials available in the riverine surroundings of their makers.
Makers of the masks
  • Hemchandra Goswami is the sattradhikar or the administrative head of the Samaguri Sattra, and a well-known practitioner of the traditional mask-making art.
  • According to him, masks had historically been made in all sattras, but the practice gradually died out in most over time.
  • The arts of dance, song and musical instruments are closely tied to the sattras and the one who began this was Assam’s guru Srimanta Sankardev.
  • In the 16th century, he established this art of masks through a play called Chinha Jatra.
  • The word means explaining through images.
  • At that time, to attract ordinary people to Krishna bhakti, he had presented the play in his birthplace Batadrava.
  • There, he presented two masks, which were worn to express what a person’s face could not. One was the four-headed Brahma and the other was Garuda,
  • The Samaguri Sattra had been practising mask-making since its establishment in 1663.
Majuli manuscript painting
  • It is a form of painting — also originating in the 16th century — done on sanchi pat, or manuscripts made of the bark of the sanchi or agar tree, using homemade ink.
  • The earliest example of an illustrated manuscript is said to be a rendering of the Adya Dasama of the Bhagwat Purana in Assamese by Srimanta Sankardev.
  • This art was patronised by the Ahom kings. It continues to be practised in every sattra in Majuli.
Source- Indian Express

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