A north Indian double sided hand drum that is the main accompaniment in Qawwali folk music. The body of the instrument is made of one piece of wood. Hollow, the body has two apertures of different size: one, small, that will generate high pitched sounds and another, wider, for low pitched sounds. The walls of the instrument are 2/3 centimeters thick and give it stability in the low frequencies.

The left side has a special application of a mixture of tar, clay and sand on the inner surface which lowers the pitch and provides a well-defined tone.

There are 2 ways of tightening the dholak. Sometimes they are laced with rope, with a series of metal rings. Sometimes metal turnbuckles are employed.