Besides with the advent audio cassettes and CDs they can reach out to the masses. Music maestros Pandit Ravi Shankar, Hari Parsad Chaurasia, Shiv Kumar Sharma and others have been making music for films too. The popularity for him and other musicians touched new heights abroad and in India, with offers for composing film music too pouring in. The music maestros have been better placed than the dancers after Pandit Ravi Shankar, the sitar wizard, won laurels in the West for his performance and fusion concerts. Though Indian classical dance and music are reigning supreme in the world, with both the art and artists flourishing, all is not well for classical dancers back home, she laments. In the city for directing and presenting a choreography titled Lotus of Creativity on October 19 at the ongoing Poompahar festival, Sonal shares her views on the contemporary classical music and dance scenario, the privileges and prejudices in these two areas of the arts. Her father and mentor Mangal Das Pakwas, a former Governor of Maharashtra, initiated her into dance under the tutelage of guru U.S. Rightfully honoured with many prestigious international awards, she was decorated with the second highest civilian award, Padma Vibhushan in 2003.

Credited with incredible classical dance compositions, Sonal has been performing extensively in India and the West for the past 50 years. Known for her proficiency in all genres of Indian classical dance forms, a rare accomplishment, she maintains that Bharatnatyam and Odissi are more close to her heart.

Its exploration, as such, is not only timeless but endless too,' says, the queen of Indian classical dance, Padma Vibhushan Sonal Mansingh. 'The codes of Indian aesthetics are not limited to a particular discipline but profusely strewn all over our cultural heritage dating back to the prehistoric period and the vedic age to the modern era. In town to present a choreography, Lotus of Creativity, danseuse Sonal Mansingh raises a lament for the state of Indian classical dance in this age of Bollywoodisation of naach

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