King Chakradhar 

Earlier Raigarh State had area about 1486 square miles. In its South there was Sarangarh State, in North Jashpur, Udaipur and Gangpur states and in East only Gangpur State was there. Its ancient history is not well known but on basis of some historical informations the state was related to Gond dynasty of Chanda. The Raigarh state was established by Madan Singh who came here from a small village Bairagarh of Chanda District. After reaching Raigarh how he established his kingdom it is not known. After his death Takhat Singh, Beth Singh, Dilip Singh and Jujhar Singh, Devnath Singh, Ghanshyam Singh, Bhupdev Singh became kings one by one. 

Maharaja Bhupdev Singh, had interest in music. He started the celebration of Ganesh festival in broad level. The name of his palace was BADAL MAHAL. In Ganesh festival lot of musicians , dancers and poets were participated. After the death of Bhupdev Singh his elder son became king of the state but he also died in 1924 and after that the younger son Chakradhar Singh got the kingdom of Raigarh State. Maharaja Chakradhar Singh was born on 19 August 1905 at Raigarh.                  

King Chakradhar singh  completed his education in Rajkumar college Raipur. He studied there literature, English, Sanskrit and Music. After getting kingdom in raigarh he started to search devotee artists and invite them. In his kingdom the first music teacher was Pt. jagannaath prasad from jaipur gharana who taught kathak dance here 3 years continuously. After that in 1930 Pt. Jailal has been invited in raigarh by king Chakardhar, he lived here upto death of Chakradhar Singh. King Chakradhar Singh also invited  guru Kalka prasad from Lucknow Gharana along with his three sons Acchhan Maharaj, Lacchhu Maharaj and Shambhu Maharaj. These people developed Kathak Gharana by residing here and taught music and dance not only the king's family but also the other interested people.

King Chakradhar Sing became famous in 1938 at India level. In this year,  one all India music conference was organized in allahbad (UP)  under chairmanship of king Chakradhar Singh, in this conference Chakradhar Singh went with his team of 60 artists. In 1943 one conference has been organized of all state rulers at kharigarh chhattisgarh. In this program kalyan das presented his kathak dance and kingh Chakradhar himself cooperated with him on TABLA.

In 1939 again one all India level conference has been organized in welcome party of  viceroy, in this conference Kartik Kalyan presented dance with cooperation of king Chakradhar on TABLA. Viceroy rewarded Chakardhar Singh as “SANGIT SAMRAT” King Chakradhar was not only a great artist but also he was a great research fellow of music. He had a very good knowledge of Hindi, Sanskrit, Urdu and Oriya. He was also very good writer. He had written several books on Indian traditional music like Taalbal Pushpakar, Taal Toynidhi, Nartan Sarwasya, Moorj paran Pushpakar, Raag ratna manjusha And Joshe pharhad, Nigare pharhad, Prem ke teer, Kavya kanan, Mayachakra, Ratnahar, Bairagadiya rajkumar, Alkapuri tilasmi, Ramyaras, Mriganayni.

Really he was all rounder of music, he was very good dancer also. He invented a new dance form by mixing different dance forms. He appreciated artists for new research in music In his kingdom lot of great artists and brilliant people had been honored and appreciated out of these artists Pt. Omkarnath thakur, Manhar barve, Narayan rao vyas, Pt Vishnu digambar pulaskar were the some music personalities. Pt Makhan lal chaturvedi, Dr. Ramkumar verma, Pt. Mahaveer prasad Dwivedi, Pt Padumlal punnalal bakshi often Participated in literature programs on the invitation of king Chakradhar, he paid a lot of respect to Sanskrit literature and its masters. Lot of Sanskrit masters like Pt. Sadashiv das, Pt Shardaprasad, Pt. Kashi dutt jha, were in his kingdom. He got translated a lot of music and dance literature in Sanskrit.

King Chakradhar established a kathak gharana of raigarh on world stage. The people of raigarh has established one music academy in his memory. King Chakradhar was died on 7th oct 1947.