DEKHNI DANCE

Dekhni is a semi classical Goan dance form.The word Dekhni means “beauty” in Konkani.Dekhni song and dance is performed by a row of girls or women only,carrying panttis(small earthern oil lamps).In this dance various women or girls who act as servants of God and perform around a lovely women who is the main character in the dance.Dekhni represents an attractive mixture of western rhythms and indian voice.Some of the gestures of this dance have been borrowed from classical dances like Kathak and Bharatanatyam.
Dekhni dance usually acts as a life of a servant of God whose job is to perform dance in temples and ceremonies like weddings,carnivals.Whenever this dance is performed,it is done with Ghumat,a folk drum.
One of the most famous Dekhni song is “Hanv Saiba Poltodi Vetam”(Sir I am going across the river) this song was adopted by Raj Kapoor which was published in goa in 1926.The story about this song represents about two temple dancers who want to go for Damu’s wedding  and they approach the boatman to ferry them across the river. The boatman says,”No! The river is rough!” The dancers offers the boatman their gold jewellery,but the boatman still says,”No! so the dancers dance for the boatman and this time he ferries them across the river.The performance becomes graceful by the conversation between the dancers and boatman in the form of sing song.The dancers carry pantis which are small clay lamps oil.
Only some of the dekhni songs that were composed a long time ago are still exist.Goan Folk Dance Dekhni is performed for annual functions like Lokotsav,Yuva Mahotsav,urba.