While in Radio, Gopal Chhotray made a unique contribution to the Odia musical tradition by reviving rural opera, which had gone out of fashion, and was frowned by the city bred and puritans. He brought both popularity and respectability for this genre by adapting them for broadcast by the AIR in 1960. He restored Baisnab Pani, the doyen of Odia Jatra, to his legitimacy and started an upsurge in musical plays by building up a large repertoire, consisting of his own originals and adaptations.
