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Introduction

Muslam Khel :

It is certain that the Pestle dance came into Goa during the Kadamba dynasty, established in Goa A.D. 980 and 1005. There is a belief that it was first performed before the gate of the fort in their capital of Chandrapur (modern Chandor), in celebration of the victory of the Vijayanagar prince Harihar over the Cholas.

The Christians of Chandor keeps up a tradition by performing this kind of dance annually. Their costumes for the occasion are in the Yadavas style. The Shivalinga symbol is brandished and waved in the dance, dancers with burning torches accompany it.

At the end of the dance, a devdasi girl dances up with water and brooms and sweeps the ground danced over and smoothens wet clay or cow dung over it. She receives a customary fee. All this is at the main, public location of the dance; but the troupe proceeds, like the mel troupes in the Shigma, to perform in the courtyard of one house after another.

They sing a verse that announces the coming of the dance to the house and ask a lamp to be brought out. Though Chandor is almost entirely Christian in population, it retains memories and vestiges from the Hindu regime of the Kadambas, seen on the occasion of the Musalam Khel.

See Also Other Folk Art Forms of Goa:

( Dashavatara | Dekhni | Dhalo | Dhangar | Fugdi |Ghodemodni | Goff | Kunbi | Mando | Muslam Khel |Ranmale | Samayi Dance | Veerbhadra | Other Folk Dances )