A Slow-Fashion Label, a Rebel Mom and 10 Other Stories Our Readers Loved Most

eShe completed two years this July! Here are the most read stories of each month in our second year of ideas and inspiration!

July 2018: Home @ Work

Workspaces don’t have to be defined by ‘corporate’ formality. We featured three women-led teams that do great work in informal settings, with open spaces, plants and maybe even a mother around for company, such as Simran Maini (in photo), whose team works out of her mom’s garage and have their meetings on the lawn!

The package of three stories also featured Simran Lal, creative director of luxury lifestyle label Nicobar whose workplace is set on her family farmhouse amidst tall trees and plenty of open spaces, and Aleya Sen, co-founder of Chrome Pictures, who embraces a sustainable lifestyle both at home and at work.

August 2018: The Happiness Curriculum

Retired schoolteacher Neera Kohli noticed something missing in the school curriculum: how to be happy. So she launched a new curriculum for Indian schools to teach kids life skills. Readers from around the world loved her story of love, hope and her drive to make kids happier.

September 2018: Life of Science

Science bloggers Aashima Dogra and Nandita Jayaraj are putting the spotlight on women working in various fields of science across India. “Marriage is an impediment to women scientists,” they found. Some readers argued, some agreed.

October 2018: The Missing Ingredient

The one thing that unravelled our anonymous columnist Unsanskari Stree’s marriage was not domestic violence or another woman. It was lack of respect. “I was a commodity, something to be delivered with hymen intact, from parents to husband,” she writes.

November 2018: Breaking Free of Domestic Violence

Atikaa Ahluwalia is educated, well-travelled and has worked in fashion. She also had to face partner violence. Her credentials only made it harder for her agony to be taken seriously. She shares why she took the man to court: “The unabashed, consistent sense of entitlement in the men accused in the #MeToo accounts and sheer number of horror stories out there made me realise the cost of our collective silence.”

December 2018: The Fast Tide of Slow Fashion

With her line of sustainable clothing called ‘Love Change’, Dhirta Rikhye (lead image and the one above) is out to spark a revolution in slow fashion among Indian millennials. “I’m confident that if there’s a wave of slow fashion, more people will be willing to make the switch. Someone has to set an example,” she says.

January 2019: Women Behind the Lens

We featured the 11 women finalists who made it to Sahapedia’s Frames Photography Grant 2018 and the work they are doing to chronicle India’s rich culture and diversity. One was Shatabdi Chakrabarti, who is documenting the tattoo culture of the Baigas in Madhya Pradesh.

February 2019: What Came After

Fashion entrepreneur Mamta Agarwal took a difficult decision in her 30s to donate a kidney to her ailing father. But nothing had prepared her for what life held in store. Her daughter spent weeks Googling ‘percentage of deaths after kidney transplant’. Her son spent days crying in fear. Her own spiritual and healing journey began here.

March 2019: Dear Daughters

eShe’s most-read story of all time with close to a million hits, this one earned both bouquets and brickbats. eShe founder Aekta Kapoor exhorted her grown daughters to not bother about marriage, and instead focus on their own growth, career and goals. Her candid, heartfelt advice became a talking point amongst both delighted and furious readers.

April 2019: No Such Thing as a Failed Marriage

Responding to critics of her previous column, Aekta Kapoor shared even more controversial thoughts on why “there is no such thing as a failed marriage” and why such outdated terms need to be laid to rest. She also shared a strange photo of herself mock-meditating at Osho-dham.

May 2019: Access Consciousness

A fresh healing modality and life philosophy has been sweeping through urban India, leaving women quite happy in its wake. It’s called ‘Access Consciousness’, and is a kind of new-age thought movement originating in the US, the aim of which is “to create a world of consciousness and oneness, where everything exists and nothing is judged”. We spoke to practitioners like Shaira Chaudhry (in photo) about their views.

June 2019: The Science of Happiness

Award-winning neuroscientist Dr Vidita Vaidya is studying the circuitry of emotions to help future generations protect their brains and fight psychological disorders. Highly relevant at a time when mental illness is on the rise, our June cover personality’s work is poised to have a far-reaching global impact.

First published in the July 2019 issue of eShe