Indrani Rahman (19 September 1930, Chennai – 5 February 1999, New York City) was an Indian classical dancer of Bharata Natyam, Kuchipudi, Kathakali, Odissi and the country's first beauty pageant titleholder.

Indrani Rahman was born in Chennai (then Madras), the daughter of Ramalal Balram Bajpai (1880–1962), sometime president of the Indo-American League, by his wife Ragini Devi (née Esther Luella Sherman).

This happened after a fateful meeting with the great rajadasi, (royal courtesan) Jetti Tayamma of Mysore, from whom she started learning Bharata Natyam.

[citation needed] Indrani started learning dance in her mother's company, at age nine, and accompanied her as she travelled through, Americas, and Europe.

After learning Odissi for three years, from Guru Sri Deba Prasad Das, she went on to popularise it, through performance in various parts of India and the world.

[4][17] In 1976 she became a faculty member of the dance division at the Juilliard School at New York's Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, taught in various American universities, including Harvard, and spent her remaining two decades in the United States, touring extensively.