A certification for Kuthu dance? It’s possible now

The purpose? To certify and develop modules for every genre of the art form – from our local ‘Kuthu’ to Karakattam and Rajasthani Ghoomar (made popular by Deepika Padukone in Padmaavat). To this effect, Sherif visited UK recently to collaborate with choreographers from across Europe for this venture – launching the Global Dance Council at the UK House of Parliament in Westminster.

“It was a great experience, and I hope this project will support dancers of every genre from across the country.

The idea is for India to pay more attention to dance as a career/ profession and for artistes in the field to garner more recognition. Now we are in the process of preparing modules and will soon introduce them to even schools and activity centres, etc,” explains Sherif.

With the UK launch gaining a lot of eyeballs, the onus is now on his team to make Chennai a worthwhile spot as the head of the Indian chapter.

“I am thrilled that we were able to make Chennai the centre of the enterprise in our country, as it gives me a chance to focus on popularising our Tamil folk and dance forms more. Apart from shedding spotlight on this, we also want to teach these forms at an affordable cost.” He is also planning a range of fusion genres that will help give local genres of a dance a more global image. “We have identified an international form and an ethnic form that are similar in style and combined them. For instance, kuthu meets hip-hop and becomes kuthu-hop. We don’t want Bollywood and Bharatanatyam to be the only two flagbearers of dance for foreigners to identify India with.

This is part of a long-term plan that will bear fruition in the coming years,” Sherif states.