Becoming ‘folk’: religion, protest and cultural communism in the Kabigāna of Ramesh Sil and Gumani Dewan

The relationship between ‘folk’ performances and contemporary local/global sociopolitical conditions is intrinsic to the continuity of these genres. Kabigāna (or, ‘song of poets’) is one such ‘folk’ performance genre which in the first half of the twentieth century underwent a striking shift in terms of its content and presentation. Two performers, kabiẏāla Ramesh Sil in Chittagong (Bangladesh) and kabiẏāla Sheikh Gumani Dewan in Mursdhidabad (West Bengal), infused Kabigāna with messages of egalitarianism, anti-capitalism, communism and progressive thought while still retaining the ideas of religious piety. While Sheikh Gumani was well versed in Hindu mythologies and the epic traditions, Ramesh Sil was initiated into the Māijabhāndārī tarikā early in his life. The two performers were even brought face to face in the March 1945 session of the All Bengal Progressive Writers and Artistes’ Convention through a Kabigāna contest. This article explores the regional variants of Kabigāna as practised by Ramesh Sil and Sheikh Gumani in order to understand ‘folk’ performers as local actors within the larger discourse of Leftist progressive thought. By situating both these performers in the decade of the politically turbulent 1940s, I argue how a ‘people’s’ history of performances needs to be reread methodologically by taking individual voices of performers into account as they juxtaposed religious piety, egalitarianism and protest through their virtuosity.