Mumbai professionals swap desk jobs for weekend dhol beats

Every weekend, dozens of Mumbai professionals, production managers, vice presidents, executive assistants and engineers, trade their corporate roles for the heavy beat of the dhol. Around 50 gathered last Sunday evening at Fort for a Ganpati 'Aagaman' ceremony, where the drumming was intense enough to rattle the chest yet meditative. In the pathak, designations vanish: a senior executive becomes just another player following the beat.

Many have been playing for nearly a decade. Shreenath Anand Vemul, a production manager from Ghatkopar West, said dhol tasha is about emotion, discipline and brotherhood. Beatrice Dalgado, an executive assistant at a US financial firm in Chembur, said the instrument connects people to their roots and is "the heartbeat of our celebrations." Neelesh Vijay Bharankar, a vice president at a global financial and risk advisory firm, started his own pathak a decade ago while learning the instrument. He said weekends once meant family time but now go to practice and performances, managed through discipline.