Composer: Vidhvaan G. Gurumurthy
Ragam: Ragamalika
Talam: Khanda Chappu
Language: Sanskrit
Choreographer: Smt. Neha Parikh
Narasimha (Sanskrit: “Man-Lion”) one of the 10 avatars (incarnations) of Lord Vishnu.
Lord Narasimha is known primarily as the 'Great Protector'. Narasimha is mostly known by the legend that
describes how creatively he destroys his devotee Prahlad's demonic father and tyrant Hiranyakashipu.
Hiranyakashipu wanted to avenge the death of his elder brother (Hiranayaksa) in the hands of Lord Vishnu.
After many years of deep penance to appease Lord Brahma (The Creator) and attain magical powers to defeat Lord
Vishnu, Lord Brahma got satisfied with his devotion and gave him a boon. Hiranyakashipu asked for eternity,
but Lord Brahma gave him the boon to choose the way in which he would die. Thus Hiranyakashipu thought he
could attain immortality by asking that he cannot be killed by man or beast or devil or Lord, in air or water
or sea, during day or night, by any weapon made of steel or stone or wood, and indoors or outdoors. After
ensuring that he cannot be killed, Hiranyakashipu became a tyrant and decided to conquer everything.
Hiranyakashipu and his wife Kayadhu gave birth to Prahlad in the Ashrama of Narada Muni. Sage Narada used to
tell stories of Lord Vishnu to child Prahalad. Hearing the glorious tales, Prahalad grew up to become an
ardent devotee of Lord Vishnu. Hiranyakashipu, who wanted everyone to worship him, was greatly disappointed by
his own son chanting the names of Maha Vishnu. All the efforts of Hiranyakashipu in changing the mind of
Prahlad were in vain. At last he got very angry with his son and decided to kill him. Every time
Hiranyakashipu tried to kill Prahlad, Lord Vishnu’s hands magically protected him. The King’s soldiers tried
to kill Prahlad by poisoning him, drowning him, and throwing him down a mountain, but Gob Vishnu saved him
from all these attempts. Then Hiranyakashipu created a bonfire and asked his sister Holika to sit inside it,
with Prahlad on her lap; Holika was immune to fire, so the king thought his son would be killed, but Prahlad
was not touched by the fire.
The angry king, Hiranyakashipu, challenged Prahlad, and asked him where can Lord Vishnu be found? Prahlad
replied “My Vishnu is omnipresent, and there is not a single place He is not found”. The king was furious and
got up from his throne and asked Prahlad “Can you show me your Vishnu in this pillar as well?” Prahlad says
“Yes, He is!” The King hit the pillar strongly with his mace. With a thundering sound the pillar cracked and
Lord Vishnu appeared in the form of Lord Narasimha.
Narasimha was half lion and half man. The furious Narasimha grabbed Hiranyakashipu, pulled him to his lap and
tore open his body with his claws to kill him. Lord Narasimha took this way to kill Hiranyakashipu so that
Lord Brahma’s boon was kept true. This happened during twilight hours, which was neither day nor night. He sat
on the threshold of the room keeping the body of Hiranyakashipu on thighs, used his nails to kill him vs a
weapon which is neither inside nor outside and pierced his nails into the body of Hiranyakashipu and opened
his stomach. The demon king was killed in a moment. Prahlad’s belief in Lord Vishnu was rewarded and once
again, the world was saved from a tyrant.
Narisimha Kauthuvan is a composition in praise of God Narasimha and Nithya will depict Narasimha and
Prahlad in her dance.
Nithya’s remarks:
I am dedicating this dance to my maternal grandparents (Panchu thatha and Amulu patti). Thatha is a devotee of God Narasimha, and growing up whenever I would perform, his first question after telling me that it was good was “why can’t the dance ever be on Narasimha?”. So, I knew the second I was doing an arangetram, that this Narasimha Kuathvam just HAD to be in the repertoire. I love the fierceness of this song, as well as the interesting nritha, and thinking of how much my thatha will enjoy seeing me dance this piece makes such a fierce and powerful song emotional too. too.