Dr. Sonal Mansingh

Dr. Sonal Mansingh is a prominent Indian classical dancer who specialises in Bharatanatyam and Odissi. She is also a teacher, researcher, choreographer and social activist. Over the years, she has practiced many dance forms including Manipuri and Kuchipudi.

She was born to Arvind Pakvasa and Poornima Pakvasa, a noted social activist in Mumbai on 30th April 1944. Her grandfather, Mangal Das Pakvasa was a freedom fighter, and one of the first five Governors of India.

Her urge to help society led her nomiation in the upper house of the Indian parliament, Rajya Sabha by the Bhartiya Janata Party in 2018. Furthermore, she is a trustee of Ritambhara Gramin Vikas Trust at Saputara in the Dang district of Gujarat. Additionally, she is a member of the Committee on Empowerment of Women.

As a dancer, she also made dances about problems faced by women and environmental issues. Although, she often created dances based on stories from Indian mythology.

She started to learn dance at the age of four, starting with Manipuri. When she was seven years old, she learned Bharatanatyam. She got serious about dancing in the 1960s and began training under Odissi teacher Kelucharan Mohapatra.

She didn't stick to just one style, though. She also learned about Odissi culture and tried different dance forms like Chhau and Kuchipudi. She worked hard on expressing emotions through gestures, called abhinaya. Besides dance, she also learned Hindustani and Carnatic classical singing and knew Sanskrit and German well.

She was often invited to teach and perform internationally and travelled widely both in India and abroad. When it comes to teaching, she makes sure it includes social views intertwined with the importance of other art forms like literature, poetry, languages, sculpture and painting.

In 2002, famous filmmaker Prakash Jha made a documentary called 'Sonal,' celebrating 40 years of her dancing journey. The documentary won the National Award in the Non-Fiction category. It all started in 1962 when she stunned a big crowd in Mumbai with her first ever on-stage dance performance.

She also produced and directed telefims 'Devi Durga' and 'Krishna Charit' commissioned by Doordarshan in 1993 and 1994 respectively.

As a author, she published one book, 'Classical Dances (Wisdom Tree), 2007.' She was even nominated as one of the NAVRATNAS for Swachh Bharat Abhiyan by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to carry forward the message of Swachha, Swastha and Shreshtha Bharat through arts and culture all over the country.

She conceptualised, directed and was Guru-Shreshta (Supreme Master) of an unusual dance reality show - 'Bharat ki Shaan - Rumjhum' viz. Indian dances v/s Non-Indian dances commissioned by DD National.

On personal front, Sonal met Lalit Mansingh at an art festival in Geneva and they married. She returned to Delhi to pursue her career in dance and their relationship ended when they couldn't sustain a long-distance marriage. But she faced financial struggles, even resorting to selling prized possessions like her mother’s gold bangles and borrowing money.

Through hardships, she discovered her free-spirited nature. She met Georg Lechner, a German photographer, and their relationship blossomed despite his existing marriage. Together, they promoted classical dance in Europe, though their engagement didn't lead to marriage.