Telangana Culture

Telangana's culture grew from two worlds that met on the Deccan plateau: the Telugu village traditions of the Kakatiya country around Warangal, and the Persian and Urdu courtly culture of the Qutb Shahis and the Nizams in Hyderabad. Folk dance, ballad singing, tribal festivals and some of India's finest hand-woven saris live side by side with the Deccani language, ghazals and qawwalis of the old city.

Dances of Telangana

Perini Sivatandavam

Perini is the warriors' dance of the Kakatiya age. Soldiers performed it before Lord Shiva on the eve of battle, and carvings of Perini dancers can still be seen at the Ramappa Temple. The dance had almost disappeared when the scholar and dancer Nataraja Ramakrishna revived it in the twentieth century from the Kakatiya-era text Nritta Ratnavali. Today it is performed by men, to the beat of drums, with powerful leaps and spins.

Bonalu

The dance of the balancing pots. During the Bonalu festival, women dressed in bright saris carry decorated pots (bonam) of rice cooked with milk and jaggery on their heads to the temples of the goddess Mahankali, stepping to drums and trumpets. Male dancers called Potharajus, their bodies smeared with turmeric and margosa leaves tied around their waists, lead the processions lashing whips.

Dappu

The Dappu is a tambourine-like drum of goat skin and wood, played with sticks. Groups of 16 to 20 Dappu dancers, wearing ankle bells, lead processions at jataras, festivals and weddings across Telangana; their rhythm is the sound of village celebrations.

Chindu Bhagavatham

The dance of colours and costumes. This lively folk theatre comes from Nizamabad district. Performers in vivid make-up and costumes act out stories from the epics and the Puranas to cymbals, tabla and harmonium, usually for village audiences.

Gussadi

The Raj Gond people of Adilabad district perform Gussadi during Dandari, their festival around Diwali. Dancers wear tall headdresses of peacock feathers, deer horns and animal skins, smear their bodies with ash, and move from village to village singing and dancing.

Lambadi

The Lambadi (Banjara) dance belongs to the semi-nomadic Banjara community found across Telangana and Andhra Pradesh. Women in skirts embroidered with mirrors and glass beads, ivory bangles and heavy silver ornaments dance to songs about sowing, planting and harvesting.

Oggu Katha

Oggu Katha is a ballad tradition of the Kuruma and Yadava shepherd communities. Singers keep time on a small hourglass drum, the oggu, while narrating the stories of their deities Mallanna, Beerappa and Yellamma, often through a whole night.

Music and literature

Hyderabad was a centre of Urdu poetry and Deccani, the Urdu dialect of the Deccan; Sultan Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah, the founder of Hyderabad, is remembered as one of the first poets to write in it. Qawwali and ghazal evenings remain popular in the old city. In Telugu, Bammera Potana, who rendered the Bhagavatam into Telugu, came from this region, and the twentieth-century poets Dasarathi Krishnamacharyulu and Kaloji Narayana Rao wrote for the people of Telangana; Kaloji's birthday, 9 September, is celebrated as Telangana Language Day.

Crafts of Telangana

Pochampally Ikat

In ikat weaving the yarn is tie-dyed before it is woven, so the pattern appears as the cloth grows on the loom. Pochampally, Puttapaka and Chautuppal villages in Yadadri Bhuvanagiri and Nalgonda districts are the home of Telangana's ikat; Pochampally ikat has a geographical indication tag, and in 2021 Pochampally was named one of the best tourism villages by the UN World Tourism Organization.

Gadwal and Narayanpet saris

Gadwal saris have a cotton body with silk borders and pallu, woven separately and joined by an interlocking weft. Narayanpet saris, from the town of the same name, are known for their simple checked bodies and temple borders. Both carry geographical indication tags.

Bidriware

Bidri is silver inlay on a blackened alloy of zinc and copper. The craft came to Hyderabad from nearby Bidar, and Hyderabad's workshops still make vases, boxes and jewellery in this style.

Nirmal toys and paintings

Craftsmen called Nakash in Nirmal town make light wooden toys and paintings, often of scenes from the Ramayana and Mahabharata, finished with natural colours and gold.

Cheriyal scroll paintings

Long painted cloth scrolls from Cheriyal in Siddipet district were once used by travelling storytellers, unrolled frame by frame as the story was sung. Their bold red backgrounds and folk figures are now popular as wall art.

Karimnagar silver filigree and Pembarthi brass

Karimnagar's craftsmen twist fine silver wire into boxes, trays and ornaments, and the village of Pembarthi in Jangaon district is known for its sheet-metal brass work, from temple decorations to vessels. Both crafts have geographical indication tags.

Hyderabad pearls and bangles

Hyderabad has been a market for pearls since the time of the Nizams, and Laad Bazaar near the Charminar is famous for its lac bangles set with glass and stones.