Dona started to training under Amala Shankar, wife of Pandit Uday Shankar since she was three years old. The main turning point in her life came when she started to train under Guru Giridhari Nayek for Odissi dance form. The most meaningful development took place when she confronted her guru Kelucharan Mahapatra. Under her guru`s guidance she flourished completely into a singer. She developed her skills immensely.
Guru Kelucharan Mahapatra considered Dona as a dedicated student and started coming down to Kolkata to give her dancing lessons. He stayed at Dona`s house and taught her with great care and dedication. Sometimes even Dona travelled to her Gurus place and took lessons during winters, summers and puja vacations, while she was still a school going girl. She participated in various programmes during this period and was accompanied by her guru.
She has performed all across the country and around the world and has gathered tremendous love and appreciation from crowds and audiences.
She is one of the few Odissi exponents who maintain pure guru Kelucharan Mahapatra gharana. Along with her performance she also teaches dance at her school Diksha Manjari. She is the head of the Odissi department of Bharati Vidya Bhavan as well as Tecno India Schools. She is `A` graded artist of Doordarshan
Diksha: Her Dance School
Dona Ganguly opened a school for dance in the city of Kolkata under the name of "Diksha Manjari". Smt Lata Mangekar was invited to inaugurate the institute. It is an institute of culture where songs, dance, classical music, instruments are taught. The institute has a capacity of 2000 students, and she teaches Odissi herself. Diksha has other departments as well like drawing, yoga, swimming and karette.
The institute teaches each dance in the purest form and does not believe in mixing.
Personal Life of Dona Ganguly
Dona married Saurav Ganguly in the year 1996 and the couple has a daughter named Sana.
Major Shows Performed by Dona Ganguly
National
* Dover Lane Music Conference, Kolkata;
* Konarak Festival, Konarak;
* River Festival, Kolkata;
* Uday Shankar Dance Festival, Kolkata;
* Barak Utsov, Silchar, Assam;
* Dakshin Mukambi National Festival, Kottyam, Kerala;
* Baba Alauddin Khan Sangeet Samaraho(Maihar), Madhya Pradesh.
* Bali Yatra Cutttak;
* Kumar Utsov, Bhubaneswar;
* Bharat Bhavan, Bhopal;
* Haridas Samaraho, Brindavhan
* Samudra Maha Utsov, Puri;
* Beach Festival, Digha;
* Haldia Utsov, Haldia;
* Sankat Mochan Festival Varanasi;
* Ganga Maha Utsov, Varanasi;
* Antiquity Festival, Kolkata;
* Muktashwar Festival, Bhubaneswar;
* Mirtunjay Utsov, Varanasi
* Bhojpur Festival, Bhopal;
* Kalidas Samoraho, Ujjain;
* Taj Mohotsav, Agra;
* Chaitrakut Mohotsav, Chitrakut;
* Nirmada Mohotsav, Jabalpur;
International
* She was invited to present dance in the 15th North American Bengali Conference in New York from June 30 to July 02, 1995 where her performance was applauded by 10,000 audiences present there.
* She was also invited to perform in the North American Bengali Conference in San Francisco as well as the 27th Bengali Conference held in Detroit in 2007 where she performed with her dance troupe.
* She presented several dance programmes in the United Kingdom and Canada etc. She also performed with great success at the Eastwood Theater Hall Glasgow, Scotland along with a couple of shows in Central London during the summer of 2000.
* She has also performed at the inauguration 2010 Alexzander Palace, London.
* She was send by ICCR at the World Expo 2010 held in China.
* She has also gone to Singapore with her troupe organized by ICCR
