| MUMBAI:
Malayalam general entertainment channel Amrita TV is airing Super Troupe,
the first ever reality show for Gana Mela troupes in Kerala. Super
Troupe will air every Saturday and Sunday at 8.30 pm. Inaugurated
by Udayabhanu, the playback singer of yesteryears, the show will present state’s
12 selected troupes. Each
troupe will include singers, backed up by its own orchestra. The
channel has chosen troupes from the chain of auditions conducted in Trivandrum,
Cochin and Calicut. The troupes are drawn from Trivandrum, Aluva, Pala, Cochin,
Kannur, Calicut and Malappuram and consist of six singers and a ten-piece orchestra.
The
contestants will be judged by a three member jury panel consisting of music director
Ouseppachan, playback singer Biju Narayan and a celebrity judge who will change
with every round. The
Gana Mela traces its origin to the Koothu Patrai of Tamil Nadu, a combination
of music, dance and acting, enacted in the temple premises before a small crowd
of devotees. This temple oriented art form evolved to its present ‘music
orchestra group’ over decades, gradually moving out from the temple to the
Utsav grounds and auditoriums and the content of the concerts shifted from devotional
music to film songs. The
channel claims that Super Troupe is its attempt to “revive an art
form that has been sliding into decline” and to help it to “recover
lost ground through the highly popular medium of a reality show”. | 
