All about Inking a Progressive and Inclusive Society

Coming out is a lifelong journey and each 'coming out moment' is different from the next. Today homosexuality and queer identities are accepted to a certain extent. However, within the boundaries of family, home and school these people still struggle to assert their sexuality and gender choices. Things are a lot more complicated than they need to be- Pritisha Borthakur 

Pritisha Borthakur is a busy entrepreneur, communications consultant, an author and a mother to two children. The last year and half have been pretty eventful for this Assamese lady who is based in Noida. While her collection of poems titled 'A dash of Gay for any day' has received considerable acclaim and acceptance from people within and outside the LGBTQ community her children's book 'Puhor and Niyor's Mural of Family Stories' has been lauded by readers in India and abroad.

Talking about her experience of crafting, A dash of Gay for any day, Pritisha says, "Well it is difficult to understand the realities of discrimination without experiencing them first-hand. I was a journalist when I had taken a conscious call to write extensively on the queer community. The initial experience was like a splash of cold water on my face that immediately awakened my senses, delivering a momentary burst of surprise. As a straight woman, I realised simply how little I know about the overall LGBTQIAP+ struggle towards tolerance and equal rights. I learnt from my friend, Poran Jyoti Gogoi (also called Romi), how he and several of his friends have had to overcome significant, often life-changing experiences that took a level of courage that we rarely experience."

According to Pritisha, for the LGBTQIAP+ coming out is not a 'one and done' event for they need to come out with every new person they meet and in every new situation they enter. "It has to happen when they change jobs, when they make new friends and even when they attend parties. Coming out is a lifelong journey and each 'coming out moment' is different from the next. Today homosexuality and queer identities are accepted to a certain extent. However, within the boundaries of family, home and school these people still struggle to assert their sexuality and gender choices. Things are a lot more complicated than they need to be. In the course of the last ten years, I got introduced to several people from the LGBTQIAP+ community. I can proudly say that I am a much more informed person now," she shares.

This collection was essentially written in an attempt to capture some of the realities of being LGBTAIAP+. "The media presents a very flashy, very unrealistic image of what it means to be LGBTQIAP+. Ofcourse the image portrayal is getting slightly better now. I see members of the LGBTAIAP+ community as ordinary people with problems of their own, and I wanted to get at the heart of that. This collection of poems is an attempt to capture what an LGBTAIAP+ person suffers through. It also captures some of the weird little moments of daily life," says Pritisha and adds, "People are so obsessed with labels and categories. The desire to make everything easy to understand has, paradoxically, made the world so much more complicated than it ever needed to be. I prefer a world where your only label is your name. I sincerely believe that we shouldn't need to introduce ourselves with a dozen different tags. I am a friend in the orbit and have seen enough to know that I want better for them, and researching for this collection only cemented that desire."

Talking about her early life, education, family background and professional life, Pritisha says, "I was raised in Nagaon in Assam. My parents were in the government service. My love for reading books goes back to my childhood. I along with my family used to set aside time almost every day to listen to music, write poetry, paint and grow plants. My parents consciously created an atmosphere for me to just be me. This encouraged me to dream and imagine freely." Pritisha says that most of her childhood memories are about Dergaon, where her grandparents lived.

Pritisha is a graduate in English and holds a Masters degree in journalism from Delhi University. She started her career as a features writer with a UK-based lifestyle magazine called Expressions. Later she went on to work with reputed organisations like The Times of India, Times Internet, The Pioneer, Gulf News etc in various capacities. Pritisha has also been the editor of Beyond the Boundaries a Hong Kong-based magazine. Currently, she is an independent content and strategy consultant and is empanelled with several national and international agencies in India, Australia, Dubai, Hong Kong and Singapore. "I am also involved with several North-East brands and organisations, especially startups, as a consultant. I shall also have to add that I ventured into the hospitality business in 2019 and I co-own a café called 'Local Global' in Safdarjung Enclave, Delhi. In the same year, I co-founded an advertising agency called 'Storyweavers', which is headquartered in Mumbai with additional offices in Noida and Guwahati," Pritisha shares.

Pritisha is incidentally a national level table tennis player, an advanced diploma holder in fine arts, and a Visharad in Indian classical music. She has also self-directed a documentary called 'Wake Up Call' which is based on an individual's fight against HIV.

Pritisha has recently made my debut as a children's book author with the title "Puhor and Niyor's Mural of Family Stories".

Traditionally published by Author's Channel and released in September 2021, Puhor and Niyor's Mural of Family Stories is a progressive children's book that celebrates family diversity. Talking about her book she elaborates, "The book has been named after my twin sons - Puhor and Niyor. Whenever I searched for new books for my children or to gift other children, I was struck by the number of children's books that depicted one-dimensional, traditional families. I am surrounded by close friends and family with young children who don't look like that. There are so many different kinds of families. For instance there are multi-cultural families, adopted or blended families, same-sex or single parents- while this is the reality of the incredible tapestry of the world that we live in it does not feature in children's books. The truth also is that their homes are filled with as much love as any other home and my objective of writing this book was to simply create a sense of belonging for every child. I wanted every child to see his/her own family in the pages of my book and know that even though their family may look or do things differently it is still a family."

Written for a global audience, the book is targeted at children between the ages of five and ten. It is embellished with colourful images of different types of families. "We need a more inclusive world and for this we need to impart the right values in our children. Puhor and Niyor's Mural of Family Stories is an attempt in this direction," says Pritisha.

Pritisha Borthakur has received several prestigious awards. "Young Woman Achiever of the Year at Asia's Emerging Brands by Image Planet (held in Mumbai in 2019) and Best Digital Campaign Strategist (North India region) at GTF Women's Excellence Summit Awards (held in Bangalore in 2018) are some of the accolades that I have received," she shares.

Pritisha is presently working on a young-adult fiction to be released in 2023. "I also have plans to build an ed-tech platform for specially-abled people in the near future," she concludes.

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