Eminent Kathak dancer Sitara Devi, who has been in hospital for the past two weeks, underwent a minor surgery on Sunday, and is currently in the intensive care unit, a family member said on Tuesday.
“She was fine yesterday [Monday]. However, she was not feeling well today and was shifted to the ICU,” Rajesh Mishra, the son-in-law of the 94-year-old danseuse.
Devi reportedly had some complications and doctors at the Cumballa Hill Hospital and Heart Institute here were not sure about operating on her due to her advanced age. However, the surgery went well.
Devi was born Dhannolakshmi in the family of Brahmin in Kolkata in 1920.
When she was 11, the family moved to Mumbai, where she impressed Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore with a three-hour solo recital.
Over the next six decades, she became a kathak legend and is known as a pioneering force in bringing the genre to Bollywood.
She is the recipient of prestigious awards such as the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award, Padma Shri and Kalidas Samman.
