Rajasmita Kar in Rourkela. Picture by Uttam Kumar Pal

Bhubaneswar, April 15: Rajasmita Kar, one of the finalists of dance reality show, Dance India Dance, was in her hometown on Thursday after three months of practice and some spectacular performances.

As soon as the young talent stepped in Rourkela, she was flooded with congratulatory messages and loud cheers from her well-wishers.

“I am ecstatic and on top of the world. I have worked very hard to reach where I am today. I have participated in state reality shows such as Dhoom Macha Le and Jhoom Orissa Jhoom, but defeating hundreds of contestants from all over India and reaching the top six slot is extremely overwhelming,” said Rajasmita.

From the very first day, Rajasmita has been winning the audience’s appreciation for her powerful and innovative creations. She has been one contestant, who has shown consistency in using various props for her dance numbers.

While in one of her dance items Rajasmita used cylinders as props, in the other she used a huge acrobatic prop. This compelled one of her judges Terence Lewis to tag her as the “pahalwan” of the season.

“I also love it when grandmaster Mithunda acknowledges me as the ‘dark horse’ of the show and praises my versatility,” says the dancer.

Rajasmita learnt her basics watching television. However, after realising her passion, her parents enrolled her in Aman Nayak’s dance class. After years of dedication, Rajasmita has shown her versatility in various dance forms such as freestyle, contemporary, Bollywood, lindy hop and Karagattam.

But, her strength has always been the hip-hop and stunt dance. In a duet performance on the popular song Teri meri meri teri Rajasmita’s lyrical hip-hop number received a standing ovation. Her puppet dance on Senorita was her second best performance in the show.

“My mentor Geeta Ma, who calls me Nandu has been very encouraging and is a wealth of wisdom. I have learnt all the nitty-gritties of dancing from her. We have an extremely strenuous schedule and practise for eight hours everyday, but since we all love what we do, we have a great time,” said Rajasmita.

So what follows if she wins the DID season 3 crown? “A dance school in my home town,” she said. “There are not many dance schools that teach freestyle, hip-hop or any form of contemporary dance. Despite numerous talented dancers in our state, we are hardly recognised because we lack knowledge in these dance forms,” said Rajasmita.