UMD Moksha, the University of Maryland’s nationally competitive Indian classical dance team, recently earned 2nd place at the Origins National Intercollegiate Championship, a major national competition featuring more than 50 prestigious university teams, including Cornell, Rutgers, UC Berkeley, UC San Diego, Rice, and UT Dallas. Their Bharatanatyam performance addressed the urgent social issue of farmers’ suicides through complex choreography and emotionally resonant storytelling, bringing powerful advocacy and artistic excellence together on a national stage.
Several members of the troupe are students in the Honors College, including team captain Amrutha Alibilli (ILS), Malavika Kattuparambil (GEMS), Archisha Saxena (ILS), and Krisha Pandya (IBH). Other members include Ananya Perinkulam (team co-captain), Smrti Arava, Ankitha Shenoy, Sruthi Pillai, Akshya Mahadevan, Nina Khilnani, Aparna Ramanathan, and Anagha Gopi Vallabha.
The full team effort also relied on the leadership of team managers Nandini Bhattaram and Swetha Sridaran; faculty advisor Dr. Dina Borzekowski, SPH Research Professor of Behavioral and Community Health and Director of the Global Health Initiative; Public Relations Chair Sonu Harivanam; and Fundraising Chair Raiya Shah.
As a fully student-run ensemble, UMD Moksha is committed to representing the university through Bharatanatyam—an art form passed down for more than two thousand years as a language of rhythm, expression, and devotion—and to sparking greater interest in Indian classical dance across the UMD community.
You can watch Moksha’s Origins performance online here:
