Daring Desis
A community platform celebrating pioneering global immigrant desi women who show emerging generations what is possible.
If you can see it, you can be it.
ABOUT
Daring Desis is a storytelling platform.
Daring Desis pulls focus to women from the South Asian subcontinent diaspora who have added to a global conversation in their fields; women who will represent a world of possibilities for the millions of young Desi girls searching for people like them, doing things they dream of. Daring Desis shows them that anything is possible, that a little brown immigrant girl in Ontario can one day be Miss Marvel; that a queer, minority woman from Karachi can become world renowned astrophysicist, that a young woman from an engineering college in Chandigarh can go on to be a mission specialist on a NASA space shuttle.
It is vital for girls and women to see themselves represented on the page, see women who have balanced being Desi with all the complications that arise from existing in a third culture. So many of us are living in this unique confluence of language, culture and systems that we have adapted to survive in – why should we not thrive in it? Who can we look up to? Who are the women who have shared a similar experience, and risen to great heights?
There are so many Desi women who have dared to challenge cultural stereotypes, and have fought against the disadvantages of being a woman of colour in many different fields., and yet there are so few places to read about them, to get to know them, to learn from them.
Daring Desis will be that place.
WHY
We are now seeing some Desis on TV, in film, in politics, but Desi girls are still struggling to see themselves represented across media, in books, not just as fictional characters, but as the main characters in social, cultural, economic, technical, political worlds. With such little representation, how do we expect young Desi girls to imagine themselves in the future? To imagine the possibilities of what they can achieve, what they can change in the world? Why isn’t there a platform that allows them to see how other desi women have harnessed their main character energy?
With so many Desi children now growing up as part of a diaspora, we need to give them a platform and a variety of media in which they can see themselves reflected, and where they can imagine themselves in the future of a world full of opportunities.
WHO
Daring Desis will feature desi women from all across the world, women who have made an impact in their field, been pioneers for their generation, their community or industry. A Daring Desi woman is someone who has surged ahead where others of her background may not have before, someone who will inspire other women and girls to believe that they too can be who and what they want to be, no matter where they may end up in the world. They may be women who have achieved global recognition, they may be women who have left their mark on a small community, they may be women who have been working silently behind the scenes: Daring Desis will shine a light on any Desi woman who has broken free of a stereotype, broken past a barrier and has dared to go where women like her historically have not.
Here is just a sample set of Daring Desis to show you what kind of a community we are building, and the empowering stories we aim to share.
Desi देश (deśá) =
people of India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka
Global Desis = 44+ million
We need your help to grow this community of Daring Desis.
Do you know a global Desi women who has broken the glass ceiling, who was the first to do something, who challenged the norm in their particular environment/industry?
They don’t have to famous. Just a Daring Desi in their own right.
Nominate yourself or someone you know.
![𝐃𝐃-𝐔𝐒𝐀 🇺🇸
𝐀𝐬𝐡𝐚 𝐏𝐮𝐭𝐡𝐥𝐢 is a pioneering Indian vocalist whose genre-defying sound blends jazz, funk, soul, and disco. Born in Mumbai, she trained in Indian classical music before discovering jazz through Western records. In the 1970s, Puthli moved to the U.S., a bold step for a woman of color from South Asia trying to break into the male-dominated music industry. She faced significant obstacles, including racial and cultural barriers, but her unique voice and fearless approach set her apart.
Puthli’s breakthrough came with her iconic vocals on Ornette Coleman’s Science Fiction album, which earned critical acclaim. She went on to release a series of solo albums, blending Eastern and Western influences with experimental flair. Her 1973 debut, Asha Puthli, became a cult classic, especially in Europe, where her music found a dedicated following. Despite the challenges of navigating an industry that often sidelined non-white artists, Puthli became a trailblazer for future generations, earning praise from both critics and peers.
In a Guardian interview, Puthli explicitly expressed that she sexed it up but that she had a serious musical mission, too. “I felt the Beatles, for example, had come to India, taken sitar and popularised it in mainstream [western] music, but I didn’t think it was [one-]way traffic,” she says. “I felt: I’m Indian and I’m influenced by the west. Why can I not be accepted on an equal platform?”
Her music has been sampled by contemporary artists, and her legacy as one of the first Indian women to gain international recognition in the Western music scene remains influential.
We make every effort to verify all information of these posts but welcome any correction of fact as necessary.
Photo credit: @ashaputhli
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The Book
We are developing a beautifully illustrated book, created entirely by Desis by Daring Desis. A book that you see in bookstores, on bookshelves of Desi homes, a book that celebrates and illuminates the brilliance of many Desi women who are showing the world that we are a community finally finding a place in our adopted homes, and daring to lead the charge across many industries, many conversations. Your help in growing our community will make this book a reality.
The DDs behind DD
Founder and Project Director
Anjali Nihalchand
Anjali Nihalchand is a Desi, a Sindhi Indian who was born and raised in Hong Kong, educated in Paris and the US and now living in Melbourne, Australia. She has worked in marketing for global corporate pioneers like Richemont Group and Aman Resorts for 15 years, before launching her own Brand and Project Consultancy, Pollination Projects in 2014. She works across a wide set of industries including hospitality & travel, arts & culture, start-ups and NGOs. She is co-founder and currently managing director at Maple Tree Counselling, a boutique therapy practice based in Hong Kong and Australia. She is also working in digital amplification, and as well as a professional coach for young South Asian women under her brand Pollination Coaching. Before relocating to Australia in 2023, she was advisor and mentor to desi girls, a brand and project consultant and a diversity list candidate for the Zubin Foundation, an NGO empowering marginalised ethnic minorities in Hong Kong.
As part of Anjali’s ongoing work to raise awareness for ethnic minorities in Hong Kong, she launched and managed a bi-lingual Instagram campaign called United Colours of Hong Kong, celebrating young ethnic minorities who are Hong Kongers as much as their Chinese peers. Anjali continues to write on the subject of diversity, and has been featured in Jumpstart magazine on the topic of the Racial Minority Experience in Hong Kong and in Namaskar Magazine published in Hong Kong. She is an entrepreneur, a pollinator and an advocate in equality and the empowerment of women.
Editorial (Book only)
Mahvesh Murad
Mahvesh Murad is a Desi of Zoroastrian-Irani and Punjabi heritage, born and raised in Karachi and currently living in Malaysia. She worked in Pakistani television and radio for many years as an on screen talent with a short stint for BBC World, then as a radio jockey, writer and programming manager for Pakistan’s leading English radio station FM89, and continues to be Pakistan’s most heard female voice artist. She hosted and produced the author interview podcast series Midnight in Karachi for Reactormag.com, an online magazine published by Tor Publishing interviewing writers like Margaret Atwood, Emily St.John Mandel, NK Jemisin, Victoria Schwab, Naomi Alderman, Palo Bacigalupi and Audrey Niffenegger.
Mahvesh is also the co-editor of the short story anthologies The Apex Book of World Fiction 4 and the World Fantasy Award nominated anthologies The Outcast Hours, and The Djinn Falls in Love & Other Stories, which the New York Times called ‘exquisite and audacious, and highly recommended’. She has been a judge for the London-based independent book prize The Kitschies twice, and is a freelance writer and editor, having contributed to the Literary Wonderlands book series and multiple Vice Media documentaries. She continues to write literary criticism regularly for Tor.com and for Pakistan’s leading English daily newspaper, Dawn, with a focus on women writers.
