Avartan Dance Foundation

Here’s what movement made possible this year at Avartan Foundation:

• 720+ hours of Dance for Parkinson’s sessions
• Programs active in India & Germany
• 200+ children engaged across schools
• Work with senior citizens through movement & expression
• Pune’s first Parkinson’s Symposium successfully hosted
• Rhythms of Resilience — an award-winning production and a film born from lived stories of PD members
• Continual learning through conclaves, presentations & collaborations

Our goal is simple — make movement accessible, meaningful and inclusive.
From children discovering body awareness to seniors reconnecting with joy, to Persons with Parkinson’s building balance, mobility and confidence — we are committed to evidence-based, community-led work.

To continue expanding this impact in 2026, we are opening doors and we welcome your support.
If you or your organisation wishes to donate, sponsor sessions, or partner with us, we’d love to speak with you.

📩 [email protected]

📞 +91 9090287728

Your contribution helps us reach more schools, more senior groups, and more persons with Parkinson’s.
Let’s build movement that matters.

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As we wrap up the year, we are proud to present a truly soul-stirring edition of “My Story, My Dance” featuring the incredible Vinatha Reddy.✨

This December, we invite you into the world of “Amma Avare,” a woman whose heart has always beat for the empowerment of others. From her childhood memories of inequality in Bangalore to founding Grameen Koota, Vinatha Aunty’s life is a testament to the belief that the poor do not need charity; they need opportunity.
Even as she faced a Parkinson’s diagnosis in 2010, her spirit remained unyielding. While the condition eventually confined her to a wheelchair and impaired her speech, she found a new rhythm through dance, discovering lightness, joy, and a way to keep moving forward.

Support our mission as we continue to share these artistic and inspiring journeys of resilience. Let’s carry her courage into the new year!

Written by- .vetal
Edited by-

Vinatha M. Reddy’s book ‘The Grameen Koota Story’ is available for sale on Amazon-
https://www.amazon.in/Grameen-Finding-purpose-empowering-Vinatha/dp/9334064315

#2025

Dance for Seniors- Move, Feel, and Bloom 🌸

Dr. Sanjyot Mahajan and Tanvi Hegade will be facilitating a gentle yet joyful movement experience designed especially for senior women. These sessions invite the participants to reconnect with their body through an energetic and engaging blend of dance, movement, and music — not to master technique, but to rediscover freedom, presence, and joy in one’s own body. ✨

9th Dec’ 25
4 to 6 pm
Akhil Bhartiya Marathi Natyaparishad, Talegaon

❄️There are seasons when the body pulls inward.
When movement becomes small, quiet, intentional.
When winter asks us to slow down, to listen, to keep a little fire alive inside the bones.

This haiku is a reminder of that internal hibernation- the kind that isn’t about stillness alone, but about gathering strength. About trusting that warmth will return, that the body will open again when it’s ready.✨

In our work with movement and Parkinson’s, we see this unfolding every day:
how the body contracts, protects, holds…
and how, with patience and practice, it softens back into possibility.

Each season brings its own rhythm.
Each body finds its own thaw. ❄️

Presenting the November edition of My Dance, My Story- featuring the journey of our very own Santa Claus Mr. Fredrick Besterwitch. 🎅

Meet Freddy Uncle, a true Good Samaritan whose boundless generosity and vibrant spirit continue to inspire everyone around him. Freddy Uncles’s journey teaches us the power of unwavering benevolence, resilience in adapting, and embracing life with a joyful, active spirit despite ever occuring changes in one’s life.

Let us welcome the spirit of Christmas with this cheerful and inspiring story of Fredrick Besterwitch!✨🎅🎄

Written by- .vetal
Edited by-

Join us in keeping these stories alive- support, share and stand with us
To read more stories in a keepsake form please reach out to us as we have complied a collection of such inspiring stories into a diary made of love!
We accept bulk orders and gifiting order for the same.

Rhythms of Resilience has been a work created with a lot of labour of love.❤️

However, as an audience member, we understand that some works of Art can be challenging to watch and to process. We would like to help break this down for you with as we discuss the aftermath of a performance. ✨

Rhythms of Resilience has been a journey where movement becomes medicine for aging bodies, stories become a source of strength, and dance celebrates the human spirit.
Directed and Choreographed by: .pawar

This work has been supported by the Lucy Bowen Awards and the Mark Morris Group, USA.

Over the past few months, our words have quietly begun to move.
In fragments of verse, in tender syllables of breath and pause — bodies learn to flow, tremors soften into grace, breath becomes a song.

Our Haiku Series written by began as a way to listen — to bodies that heal slowly, to movements that resist rush, and to rhythms that emerge only through patience. Each haiku became a small act of noticing — the way a body learns, fails, grows, blooms, and now, ripens.

From the first Haiku for the Blooming Body to Fruiting Joy in Fragile Hands, and now, Ripening — each one has mirrored the journey of those who dance with Parkinson’s, who teach us that movement is not performance alone, but presence, persistence, and peace.

And as these verses found form, something larger began to take shape — Rhythms of Resilience.
A film. A performance. A celebration of the moving body and its many stories.
This project brings together dancers, facilitators, and individuals living with Parkinson’s — tracing how rhythm, breath, and music can hold space for dignity, for expression, and for joy.

The haikus were our beginning — our quiet reflections in between rehearsals and long hours of work. Rhythms of Resilience is the fruiting of that process. The body, after all, ripens not in haste, but in time.

Each month, over 60 classes.
Countless stories of movement, courage, and care.

Across India and beyond, Hrishikesh’s Centre of Contemporary Dance and Avartan Foundation hold over 50+ sessions each month — weaving together dance, well-being, and resilience for diverse communities.

From seniors rediscovering rhythm at Deep Griha to persons with PD finding strength through “Dance for PD” where each class becomes more than practice.
It becomes dialogue. Healing. Companionship.

At Avartan and Centre of Contemporary Dance, movement is not performance.
It is a presence — unfolding quietly across geographies, one initiative at a time.