Protima Gauri Bedi (12 October 1948 – 18 August 1998) was an Indian model turned Odissi exponent. In 1990, she established Nrityagram, a dance school in hesarghatta Bangalore. Early life Protima was born in Delhi, the second of four siblings, three daughters and a son. Her father was Laxmichand Gupta, a trader belonging to a business family from Karnal district, Haryana, and her mother Reba, a Bengali. In 1953, her family moved to Goa, and in 1957, to Bombay. At age nine, she was sent to stay at her aunt's in a village in the Karnal district for a while where she studied in a local school. On her return, she was sent to Kimmins High School, Panchgani, where she received her early education. She graduated from St. Xavier's College, Bombay (1965–67). Career Modeling career By the late 1960s, she was a prominent model. In 1974, she came into the news for streaking during the daytime for the launch of the Bollywood magazine Cineblitz at Juhu Beach in Bombay. Dance career In August 1975, at the age of 26, an Odissi dance recital completely changed her life when she ran into the Bhulabhai Memorial Institute by chance, and saw two young dancers giving an Odissi performance. She became a student of Guru Kelucharan Mohapatra, from whom she learnt the art of dancing for 12 to 14 hours a day and faced a lot of hardship as a beginner. To perfect her dance, she started studying abhinaya from Guru Kalanidhi Narayanan of Madras. From then on, she started giving performances around the country. Around the same time, Protima started her own dance school at Prithvi Theatre in Juhu, Mumbai. It later became the Odissi Dance Centre. Nrityagram Nrityagram, situated on the outskirts of Bangalore, became India's first free dance gurukul, village for various Indian classical dances, consisting of seven gurukuls for the seven classical dance styles and two martial arts forms, Chhau and Kalaripayattu. She wanted to revive the guru-shishya parampara. Nrityagram was inaugurated on 11 May 1990, by the then-Prime Minister, V.P. Singh. The dance school has a small community of students from all parts of India, but with a common aim of dance. The Nrityagram ensemble was soon performing all over the world. Meanwhile, in 1992, Protima appeared in Pamela Rooks's English film, Miss Beatty's Children. Nrityagram, created as a model dance village, was constructed by architect Gerard da