PRESS RELEASE
In Feminist Rani, India’s top female leaders, role models and activists will talk about feminism in today’s context. The book will showcase a collection of interviews with path-breaking and fascinating opinion leaders – women who have advocated gender equality and women’s rights through their work, words and deliberation. In speaking lyrically and candidly of their journey, their struggles, and their victories, the book will offer readers an important insight into the many significant issues that continue to be central to the lives of women everywhere. The book will address what feminism means to successful and powerful women today. Is equality a bra-burning satirical parody, or a way for women to the odious task of being caretakers of men through meritocracy and talent?
Feminist Rani will serve as a testimony and memoir of women’s issues, as well as a lucid and comprehensive primer to feminism, within the realm of power, success and money.
Meghna Pant states, “In our society, women have been conditioned to please our brothers, fathers, husbands, sons and our bosses. What kind of life are we leading as women in India if we say ‘I will not sacrifice, I will not compromise, I will not be subservient, and I will not adjust’? That’s the basic framework of feminism in India’s context today. Adding on, she asserts, “Every woman who rises above her circumstances to shift the axis on which women stand, and gives them a higher place in society’s matrix, is an empowered female. Every woman who reframes gender biases and makes the world more hospitable to women is an opinion leader. That’s what me must strive for”.
Shaili Chopra says, “Women are a community still waiting to be mainstreamed and Feminist Rani had its origin in that thought. Feminism is not just what got global attention in 2017 – feminism is what is going to the movement of today and tomorrow. For me it’s a personal mission that women take a chance on themselves because that’s the least they can owe to themselves. We need to bring the dialogue centre stage, put the spotlight on role models, and make everyday feminism an objective. Every conversation matters”.
Editor-in-Chief at PRH India, Milee Ashwarya comments, “As publishers we feel strongly and passionately about some subjects. For me women’s issues and women empowerment is one of them. I am delighted and proud that we will be publishing Feminist Rani by Shaili Chopra and Meghna Pant this year. I don’t think there could be more suitable writers for the book. Shaili and Meghna are both trailblazers and women icons. I can’t wait to have Feminist Rani on our list”.
About the authors
Meghna Pant is an award-winning author, columnist, feminist and TEDx Speaker. Her books have been published to critical and commercial acclaim. Pant’s debut collection of short stories HAPPY BIRTHDAY (Random House, 2013) was long-listed for the Frank O’Connor International Award 2014, the world’s biggest short story prize. ONE AND A HALF WIFE (Westland, 2012) – her bestselling debut novel – won the national Muse India Young Writer Award and was shortlisted for several other awards, including the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award. Her latest book THE TROUBLE WITH WOMEN (Juggernaut, 2016) is considered a landmark in feminist writing and was described as ‘the best book from Juggernaut’ by The Hindu Business Line. Pant has also won the FON South Asia Short Story Award (2016) and The Bharat Nirman Award (2017) for her writing.
Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni describes Pant’s writing as ‘surprising and moving’, Jeet Thayil as ‘deft and expertly-tuned’, Jerry Pinto as ‘competent’, and Ashwin Sanghi as ‘provocative and inspirational’. Pant is known for having abridged the world’s longest epic, THE MAHABHARATA, into one hundred tweets that The Guardian (UK) quoted as ‘wonderfully descriptive and paced’.
Pant hosts her own online chat shows with India’s top female leaders and opinion makers – FIRST LADY, SHE’S THE BOSS and NINE MONTHS – for FirstPost, and also curates a monthly panel discussion on feminism called FEMINIST RANI for SheThePeople. She’s invited as a speaker for many of the nation’s biggest literary festivals, panel discussions and conferences. Her articles are regularly published in The Hindustan Times, The Huffington Post, Scroll, Times of India, Vogue, DNA, Mumbai Mirror, Tehelka, MidDay, Man’s World, Little India, South Asian Times, India Today, Firstpost and DailyO, among others. Pant has previously worked as a business news anchor with Times Now, NDTV and Bloomberg-UTV in Mumbai and New York.
Shaili Chopra is the founder of SheThePeople.TV, India’s no.1 digital media platform for women, dedicated to passionately championing and promoting their stories, to Empower, Engage and Elevate their efforts. It has reached over 15 million women through its online and offline network. Shaili received the Vital Voices Fellowship for 2017. Beyond Diversity Foundation also felicitated her with the Woman of Influence Award 2017 for her work with SheThePeople. In March 2016 Shaili was announced one of India’s Top 50 Most Influential Women in Media, Marketing and Advertising by IMPACT Magazine.
A familiar television face, she has been one of India’s top television editor presenters. Her prolific career in journalism, which has now furthered her into entrepreneurship. In her last role, she was the Editor and Lead Anchor at ET NOW, the Economic Times Business News Channel and earlier with India’s largest TV network NDTV where she was part of the core team that set up their business channel NDTV Profit. She is the author of the critically acclaimed Big Connect- Politics in the Age of Social Media; a book on golf and business called Birdies and Business and When I Was 25 a book in which India’s top change-agents and leaders share their stories of risk and reward.
About Penguin Random House India
Penguin Random House India is the largest English language trade publisher in the subcontinent, publishing over 250 new titles every year and with an active backlist of over 3000 titles. With a strong fiction and nonfiction list, we publish across every segment including biography, travel, business, politics, history, religion and philosophy, lifestyle, cookery, health and fitness, sports and leisure, visual books and children’s books. The children’s titles are published under the Puffin imprint.
Our illustrious list includes Booker Prize winning novels and virtually every major literary prize, including the Nobel Prize, the Magsaysay Award, the Jnanpith Award, the Sahitya Akademi Award and the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize. Several of our authors are also recipients of the Bharat Ratna and the Padma Vibhushan, India’s highest civilian honours.
Penguin Random House India is also the exclusive distribution partner for several leading local and international publishing houses in India.
