The Girl With The Runaway Taan

She is the next big thing in Hindustani classical music. Kaushiki ChakrabortyDesikan tells Shubho Deb why she is the subject of both fanfare and angry jibes

All strings attached Kaushiki Chakraborty Desikan during a performance

IN HER fourth standard, she had scored 2 out of 100 in Geography; in herClass X pre-board examinations, she had a 34 in history, which was the passmark. “My history book still had that new-book smell when I sat down withit before exams. I hated studying.” It is a different matter that KaushikiChakraborty Desikan went on to top Calcutta University in Philosophy andthen topped Jadavpur University (JU) while pursuing masters. Of course,these achievements have little relation to the fact that she is the leading fe-male Hindustani classical vocalist of her generation. But her academic trajec-tory tells the story of a certain stubbornness; and a conversation with herclarifies that, even as a musician, she owes significant debt to her determina-tion.

Kaushiki started replicating musical patterns at the age of two; by 12, shewas a scholar at the ITC Sangeet Research Academy (SRA); at 15, she was ona 50-concert tour of the US. Her father, the vocal maestro Pandit AjoyChakraborty, would often insist that there was no need for her to go to col-lege. “But I developed an interest in logic when I was in Class XI. And by theend of my higher secondary exams, I was determined to study philosophy,”says Kaushiki. She took money from her mother and, without her father’sknowledge, got herself admitted to Jogamaya Devi College in Kolkata. “Theonly compromise I made was that I chose the morning session, so that Iwould be done by 11 am.”

She had to face greater opposition when she announced she wanted to doher masters. By then she was already being hailed as the brightest vocalist ofher generation. Even the registrar of JU advised her to concentrate on hersinging. Kaushiki, however, went on to top the university.

Even at 29, Kaushiki can claim that she has spent a lifetime fighting off de-tractors. First, there was the notion that she could only sing thumris and oth-er light classical forms and was not mature enough to sing khayal. “I wasconstantly told (at SRA), ‘So and so is going to sing khayal. Will you sing athumri for 10 minutes after the recital?’ It was not until I had spent five yearsas a scholar that I got my first tour as a khayal singer.” Then, of course, therewas envy. There is a tradition of a weekly ‘Wednesday Recital’ by a scholarat SRA; these recitals are open to the general public. On days when Kaushikisang, the hall would overflow and speakers had to be provided outside forpeople who did not manage to find a seat. Often, the dais would have to beshifted around to accommodate more people. “If my recital was scheduledfor a second or third Wednesday of a month, my name would often be tornout of the month’s programme so that people coming on the first Wednesdaywould not get to know that I was scheduled to sing later that month,” shesays. The discomfort with her early success grew when she received a BBCaward at the age of 25 for outstanding achievement in music. BBC had sentacross a correspondent to film a short feature on her musical journey — par-ticularly, people and places associated with her music. “The correspondentinterviewed a number of people. He came back and said that almost every-one had something harsh to say. And most of them felt I was too young toreceive such an award. The correspondent just said, ‘There seems to besomething spiritually wrong about this’,” recollects Kaushiki.