Bhopal does ballet: Here's how this Indian ballerina is taking the dance form to cities beyond metros

Kothari and her team set up their first workshop in Bhopal; (right) Dhvani Kothari

At 21, when most young people are tentatively sketching out their futures, Dhvani Kothari Dalmia had already decided to reimagine the ballet scene of India. Fresh out of training in Croatia and Hungary, the dancer returned home with one conviction: ballet didn't yet belong to India in any formal way.

"What I realised," recalls Kothari, now 27, "is that the true meaning of ballet, the right ballet education, didn't exist here. My biggest dream was to make ballet inclusive, to really educate people on what it means. It's not just a class - it's a way of life." That conviction became the seed of the National Ballet School of India (NBSI). In just six years, the school has expanded to 10 centres across Mumbai, training more than 200 students and staging grand productions at iconic venues.
Then, in April, Kothari found herself in the last place she expected ballet to take her - Bhopal. When she thought about expanding NBSI, Kothari had her sights on India's metros. "Bengaluru, Delhi - these cities were on my radar," she says. Bhopal was not. That changed with a phone call from Ruchi Kapoor, executive director of RKDF University.

"She was so passionate," Kothari remembers. "After so long, I was speaking to someone who shared the kind of vision I had. She kept telling me, ‘You have to come here. People are waiting for something like this. They just want a chance.'"

In just six years, NBSI has grown into 10 centres across Mumbai

Within a month, Kothari and her team had set up their first workshop in Bhopal. What she found stunned her. "The love the kids had, the passion they had; it was not what I was expecting at all. I was truly, truly surprised," she says.

Children turned up wide-eyed, mimicking every detail of her teaching. "They even made us cards," Kothari smiles. "One of the kids said, ‘We never thought we'd be doing ballet. We didn't even know what it meant, but it feels like it was always meant to be.'"

The overwhelming response has already sparked conversations about formalising a programme in Bhopal. If it goes ahead, the city will join Mumbai as another centre of ballet training in India.

Kothari's own training was rigorous and traditional. She studied under Russian masters and is certified in the Vaganova method, a classical Russian system of ballet. Yet, she is quick to stress that what works in Europe doesn't always translate here. "I don't think a cut-copy-paste model works for India," she says. "Ballet requires a lot of repetition, but for young students here that can feel monotonous. So we teach the same things in different ways - variations of a plié, new music, different exercises. It keeps them engaged while building the same foundations."

Another difference, she points out, is expression. "Indians are naturally expressive. Even as children, they can talk with their eyes. That's huge in ballet, and I want people to understand we can truly perform. It comes very naturally to us." This philosophy of adapting ballet to Indian mindsets while preserving its essence is what she believes will allow the art form to take root. "Ballet is for everyone, ballet is for every day," she insists.

Over six years, the NBSI has grown beyond technique into a community. "If you meet my students and their families, it's like one big ballet family," she says.
"Everybody shares the same vision and values." Her journey has been punctuated with deeply emotional moments. Just months after she started her school, a parent told her ballet had changed her shy daughter's life, giving her the confidence to become head girl at her school. "For a 21-year-old, that was so big," Kothari reflects. "It pushed me to keep going."

For Kothari, the next frontier is not India's metros but its smaller towns. "That truly is the next step," she says. "When I started in Mumbai, ballet was non-existent. Now I feel like I have the chance to build all over again in other parts of India. You plant seeds, and then you watch them blossom into fields." Bhopal may only be the beginning. Schools in Lucknow have already expressed interest too. Here, in Mumbai, the NBSI is set to stage an original production of The Little Mermaid at the Royal Opera House in March.

Six years in, Kothari's early dream of making ballet belong to India feels less like an ambition and more like a reality in motion. "I just wanted people to understand ballet can exist in India too," she says. "Today ballet is rooted, not imported."