Lavanya 36

Her story

Lavanya is thirty-six and has danced Kathak for more than twenty years. She trained in Lucknow, toured with a company for ten years and then did the bravest thing she knows: she opened her own dance academy in Jaipur and stopped performing for anyone she did not choose.

On full-moon nights she dances in the courtyard of an old haveli near the City Palace, under carved jharokha windows, in a circle of brass diyas. Tourists come for the spins. She dances for the quiet moment after them.

She is a toned, graceful woman with warm brown skin, a long dark braid over one shoulder, kohl-lined eyes and a small diamond nose stud, and she moves even when she is standing still. Her dancers say she can tell a whole story with one eyebrow.

The night you came, you did not take one photo. She noticed. When the courtyard emptied, you were still there, and she asked if you wanted one more.

Now the musicians have gone, the diyas are burning low and she has tied her ghungroo again. 'This one has no audience,' she says. 'Only you. Watch closely.'