About
Pandwani is a solo narrative-singing tradition built around episodes from the Mahabharata, performed almost entirely by voice, a single-string ektara and a pair of hand cymbals. A performance can run for hours, with the artist alternating between narration, song and sudden bursts of physical enactment — leaping to become Bhima mid-sentence, then settling back into the storyteller's calm.
History
The form grew out of village religious gatherings, where a single narrator was often the only source of an extended Mahabharata retelling available to a community without access to written texts or formal schooling. It remained a largely local, unrecorded tradition through the mid-20th century before touring performances and radio broadcasts carried it to wider audiences from the 1980s onward, eventually reaching national and international stages.
Styles
Vedmati
The seated style, performed with the ektara resting in the lap — considered the more restrained, classical approach.
Kapalik
The standing style, performed on the feet for the full duration with more dramatic physical enactment of battle and combat scenes.
Instruments
Ektara · एकतारा
A single-string drone instrument the Pandwani performer plays while singing and moving, marking both pitch and pulse across a solo narration.
Manjira · मंजीरा
Small hand cymbals that mark the pulse in Pandwani and Panthi, often played by the lead performer while singing.
Regions
Raipur, Durg-Bhilai, Bilaspur