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What Every Celebrity Should Aspire to Be: Manisha Dass

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How many people use their celebrity to try to make lives better for others?

When most people achieve any sort of celebrity status, it’s rare for them to immediately put the newfound fame and respect they’ve earned into a means of helping others, whether at the individual level or at the cultural level. For most, they simply rest on their laurels and try to take advantage of their celebrity for whatever personal gain they can achieve.

Manisha Dass, a star on Netflix’s Indian Matchmaking, has not only used her celebrity to try to make lives better for those around her, but she is working to effect broad change in the way entire cultures perceive love and marriage.

Manisha explains how her celebrity journey began,

“In September of 2018, my cousin who is also one of my best friends came across a casting call post on Instagram for Indian Matchmaking. He managed to pretty easily convince me to send in an application – given that we had basically tried everything to find me a partner, but this. We had nothing to lose, and possibly everything to gain. Due to a lot of personal grief and loss I had gone through earlier that year, I was seeking change and positivity. We created my first ever biodata and this was followed by several interviews with the show’s production team. In April of 2019, I was informed that I was selected for the show. I met with Sima Taparia from Mumbai (the matchmaker) via FaceTime, and before I knew it was flying to Austin to meet my match.”

The process of becoming a star for Indian Matchmaking has been life-changing for Manisha, and she hopes to encourage people from all over the world to cultivate hope and take risks, even when they feel bound and trapped by cultural norms and expectations surrounding love and marriage. Manisha could have easily declined the offer to become part of the show and sunk back to cultural traditions that dictate when and how a woman should find love, but she didn’t. Manisha wants to dismantle long-held assumptions about these things, especially in the South Asian world, and help people to pursue their dreams, whether relationships or otherwise, at any age.

She explains to WUNC in North Carolina (her home state), “Change really is only going to happen if we can talk about the issues, and it’s nice to see that this show has, you know, kind of sparked a lot of these conversations. For so long, it’s been easier to kind of brush it under the carpet as a cultural sort of habit and not really talk about it, and it’s really great to see that people are coming forward and having conversations about it.” 

While it’s been life-changing for her, being a part of Indian Matchmaking is just a tiny part of who Manisha is. She holds a Masters in Public Administration and a Masters in Occupational Therapy. She currently works in the public health sphere, aiming to blend humanitarian work and science. She regularly volunteers, tutoring Spanish to local high-schoolers and also works with the homeless and refugee community in the Research Triangle area of North Carolina. Not to mention, she’s fluent in four languages! 

Manisha is what everyone who finds fame and celebrity should aspire to become: passionate about serving those in need, dedicated to helping dismantle cultural stigmas that can hold others back, and finding ways to make the world a better place. If only more celebrities followed her example!

Here are a few ways to get connected to Manisha:

Instagram: www.instagram.com/luvmanisha

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/luvmanisha

LinkedIn:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/manisha-dass-181365173/

Twitter: www.twitter.com/manishadass83 

 

Rosario is from New York and has worked with leading companies like Microsoft as a copy-writer in the past. Now he spends his time writing for readers of BigtimeDaily.com

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Lifestyle

Fozia Rashid’s Vision for a Future Where Every Woman Is Heard and Respected

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Progress often starts with someone who refuses to accept silence as the only option. Many women experience unfair treatment at work, yet feel they have nowhere safe to turn. That gap, the distance between speaking up and being supported, is where real change is still needed, and it remains one of the biggest barriers to true equality today.

Fozia Rashid knows this firsthand. After raising concerns about serious misconduct in her own workplace and losing her job as a result, she saw how isolating it can be for women who try to do the right thing. That experience pushed her to create She Speaks Out, a platform designed to give women clarity, tools, and a voice during some of the most challenging moments in their careers.

From the beginning, her aim was not to build another information site. She wanted a space where women could feel understood, where complicated processes were broken down into simple steps, and where no one felt that reporting misconduct meant stepping into a dark tunnel alone. Her HR training helped shape this approach, turning what is often overwhelming into something practical, direct, and genuinely supportive, especially for women who feel lost navigating workplace policies.

Her long-term vision stretches far beyond offering resources. Fozia wants She Speaks Out to help shift the culture around how women are treated at work. She believes that when women share their real experiences, discrimination, dismissal of their concerns, or subtle daily biases, it exposes patterns that organisations can no longer ignore. This focus on storytelling is not about sympathy; it is about awareness. Stories make the invisible visible, and visibility forces change in a way that statistics alone rarely can.

A key part of her mission is amplifying those voices so they reach people who can influence policy and workplace culture. She hopes the platform will push employers to rethink how they respond to reports, how they support employees, and how they build environments where women don’t fear retaliation for raising concerns. She wants leaders to understand that equality is not a slogan, it is a responsibility that requires honest action and genuine accountability.

Fozia also envisions She Speaks Out playing a role in larger societal change. She wants the platform to encourage companies to review their internal practices, improve reporting structures, and train managers to recognise and address problems rather than avoid them. She hopes the platform will support the push for stronger workplace protections and help challenge outdated beliefs about women’s roles, abilities, and credibility. The goal is simple: fair treatment should not depend on who you are, but on the basic respect every employee deserves.

As the platform grows, she aims to build a strong community where women can connect, support one another, and encourage those who feel unsure or unheard. A community where experiences are shared openly, not whispered privately. She believes that building solidarity among women is one of the most powerful steps toward lasting equality. When one woman speaks up, it can be dismissed. When many do, it becomes a movement that organisations cannot afford to overlook.

For Fozia, the future is not just about better policies or clearer reporting tools, though those matter. It’s about creating workplaces where women don’t have to prepare themselves for resistance every time they raise a concern. A future where safety and respect are not exceptional, but expected.

And through She Speaks Out, she is steadily pushing that future forward, giving women what she once needed most: a place to be heard, believed, and supported without hesitation, and a reminder that they never have to face these challenges alone.

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