Women of Colour Making Their Mark in Australia #BreakingTheBias

Women of Colour

Making Their Mark in Australia #BreakingTheBias

By Rekha Rajvanshi

Marked annually on March 8th, International Women’s Day is celebrated globally to recognise the social, economic, cultural and political achievements of women. Significant activities take place worldwide as women’s groups and organizations come together to raise awareness about women’s equality and lobby for accelerated gender parity. In Australia too, women of Indian origin are contributing contribute to all spheres of life. They are business executives and owners, entrepreneurs, scientists, doctors, lawyers, philanthropists, mayors, nonprofit leaders, and community volunteers. On behalf of DESI Australia, I got an opportunity to speak with eight remarkable women who are passionate about their work and have made a mark in Australia. Let’s meet them today.

Lisa Singh - Director of the Australia India Institute, Former Australian Senator, First female MP of South Asian descent

Lisa Singh is a former Australian Senator and was the first woman of South Asian heritage to be elected to the Australian Parliament. She is the CEO of the Australia India Institute, a leading research and policy think-tank advancing Australia-India relations at the government, business, diaspora and academic levels. This is in addition to being the Deputy Chair of the Australian Government’s Australia-India Council and sitting on the advisory board of the University of Melbourne’s Asialink. In 2014, Lisa was awarded the Pravasi Bharatiya Samman by the President of India for building friendly Australia-India relations, the highest civilian honour for a person of Indian origin. In 2016, a highlight of her career was representing Australia at the United Nations General Assembly.

Lisa’s journey, like most women leaders, hasn’t been easy. She says - ‘As the first woman of Indian heritage to be elected to the Australian parliament, I became a role model for other women of Asian backgrounds to aspire to public office or leadership roles. Of course it was challenging being in politics, which was still a predominately male domain but I was inspired by so many amazing women leaders who went before me.’

Lisa is an inspiration to many. Her advice to women is - ‘Try to live up to your own sense of confidence, that allows to grow, learn how to become agile and adaptive, because let’s face it the system is biased, but don’t lose the sense of who you are, of the value of the diversity that you bring because that is your power.’

Melissa Montario - Chief Executive Officer at Community Migrant Resource Centre

Melissa Monteiro is the CEO of the Community Migrant Resource Centre, Pro Bono Australia, IMPACT Australia 21 winner and Salvation Army Multicultural Ambassador (2020) has made a significant contribution down under. She is also a published author of ‘The Girl From Mumbai.’ Melissa has been a tireless advocate for women and has created awareness around gender bias, equity and empowering women for the last 7 years. She has

Sheba Nandkeolyar - Founder CEO MultiConnexions Group, Global VP DE&I, International Advertising Association

Sheba Nankeolyar is the CEO of MultiConnexions Group. She recently got elected as the President of International Advertising Association (IAA Australia), the first woman President from an Indian background in 46 years since the Association was set up in Australia.

Sheba is passionate about India and through her various roles, she has been able to facilitate building hundreds of toilets in villages for women, distributing free hearing aids, clean drinking water through nano tech products supporting financially disadvantaged children to complete their education. These days Sheba is heavily involved in mentoring Next Gen migrant & woman start up founders. She actively mentors women supported by Department of Science, Energy & Resources for the BFF or Boosting Female Founders program.

Like all the other successful women Sheba also had to confront both gender and cultural biases in the workplace. She overcame the stereotypes about her cultural background in workplaces and in business as she mentions – ‘let your performance speak for itself! And I must share that IT DID!’ ‘As a woman migrant I know the cultural and gender biases exist. I want to help new migrants find their way in the professional & business world.’ Sheba says. ‘My mantra in life is that talent, passion & love for what you do, combined with hard work, kindness, honesty, loyalty, and integrity will take you far. I am deeply religious and have faith in a power beyond oneself which enables you to do more. Believe in yourself and the world will believe in you’ She reveals.

pioneered the Inspiring Change Women’s Conference successfully bringing hundreds of women together each year to navigate around the issues that effect them in their everyday lives. She has also been focussed on Growing the TOWARDS BELLONGING PROGRAM that builds relationships that focus on SAFETY and WELLBEING of Migrant, refugee and asylum seekers children.

In 2020 Melissa founded the IWE, Indian Women Empower group that is raising awareness on Domestic and Family Violence. This group is committed to provide domestic violence services and employment pathways to vulnerable women from the Indian Diaspora. It’s aim is to provide support to women in Australia, experiencing domestic violence, relationship issues and employment challenges by offering mentoring programs, seminars, legal and financial guidance, and vocational training workshops. ‘To become a transformational leader who inspires change you need to be able to create an inspiring vision of the future for yourself.’ Mitu Bhowmick Lange – a film producer, director and founder of the Mind Blowing Films

Mitu Bhowmick Lange is one of the most renowned names contributing to the global outreach of Indian cinema in the past decade. Mitu is the Director & Founder of Mind Blowing Films, and the festival director of the Indian Film Festival of Melbourne, and Indian Film Festival, Sydney. Her company Mind Blowing Films is the leading distributor of Indian films in Australia, NZ, Fiji and Papa New Guinea. Mitu also curates films from Australia and New Zealand for the International Film Festival of India (in Goa) and the International Film Festival of Kolkata.

Mitu began her career in Bombay where for six years she directed several documentaries and TV shows including entertainment, news and fashion magazine programs and a daily breakfast show for leading channels including BBC World, Star Plus, Zee TV and Sony TV. In Australia too Mitu has produced and introduced several Indian productions to Australia, Her work has been recognized in Australia.

Mitu is credited to be the first distributor to have successfully integrated Indian Cinema releases to the mainstream exhibitors. There by streamlining and growing Indian films presence in Australia. Mitu is a passionate advocate of Equality, Equity and Inclusivity especially in Arts and Cinema, She says – ‘the films and arts as the strongest cultural bridges between countries and communities.’

Shubha Kumar - President of India Club, Recipient of Premier’s Multicultural Community Harmony 2022 Award

Shubha Kumar moved to Australia 47 years ago and co-founded the India Club in 2004, a local not-for-profit organisation based in Sydney for Australians and those of Indian origin. Shuba is awarded the Premier’s Multicultural 2022 NRL Stepan Kerkyasharian AO Community Harmony Medal recently.

Shubha has been instrumental on organizing iconic India Fair at Olympic Park, Diwali celebrations; community projects to untangle fear and myths, to wake up community by educating and promoting integration and inclusivity to uphold cohesion in our multicultural society and to challenge and put a dent when people experience family violence or severe stresses. Her challenges were - ‘adjusting to the male work environment, taking workmates to task when they challenged my culture; in community standing firm on my views and decisions focusing on my vision to name a few. ‘

‘Multiculturalism, inclusivity, Harmony and goodwill is what I stand for with sincerity, perseverance, dedication and dynamism’ she added. Her vision is to construct India Club building –‘ A must visit unique attraction in Sydney, will happen in my lifetime and the ‘How’ I have left for the universe to figure it out to make it happen.’

Roanna Gonsalves – An Award Winning Author

Roanna Gonsalves is an award-winning author of the acclaimed collection of short fiction The Permanent Resident. Written as part of her PhD at UNSW, Roanna’s 16 short stories brought her into limelight and she is considered as one of the best South Asian writers in Australia.

Roanna is the recipient of the Prime Minister’s Australia Asia Endeavour Award, and is co-founder co-editor of Southern Crossings. Roanna works as a Lecturer in Creative Writing at UNSW, Sydney. Roanna’s series of radio documentaries, On the tip of a billion tongues, commissioned and broadcast by Earshot, ABC RN, is an acerbic socio-political portrayal of contemporary India through its multilingual writers.

Roanna’s screen credits include working as a director, scriptwriter and script consultant for documentary, drama, corporate and commercial projects. She has been teaching, supervising and mentoring emerging prose writers and screenwriters within communities, schools, literary organizations and institutions such as New York University Sydney, UNSW, Western Sydney University, Macquarie University and the Australian Film, Television and Radio School (AFTRS).

Her advice to upcoming writers is ‘Read all you can and write as often as you can. As with anything, it’s all about practice.’

Saba Zaidi Abdi - an Indian actor, director and media personality

Saba Zaidi Abdi is the pioneer of South Asian media in Australia. In 2000, Saba became the Founding Director and CEO of Vision Asia, the first independent DTH platform – linking South Asian communities in Australia and New Zealand with the Indian subcontinent through television. After successfully building that business, Saba worked with Fetch TV, where she was a consultant for five years, to launch the first South Asian IPTV service in 2010. Saba is also actively involved in the Sydney multicultural theatre scene, launching ‘Adakar’, a South Asian community-based theatre and cultural group in 2014.

Saba is a fine actor. She acted in many dramas before she was offered a major role in ABC’s Netflix 15 episode Serial ‘The Unlisted.’ She was also featured in a small role in ABC’s ‘The Letdown 2’ series. We will soon see her in another ABC serial ‘Summer Love.’

Saba has won many National and International Award. Her major contributions are launching first Indian DTH satellite service in Australia ‘Vision Asia’, setting up South Asian channels on Fetch TV IPTV Platform and establishing Adakar Theatre & Cultural Group.

Mantra of Saba’s success is ‘Be sincere and honest about your work, enrich yourself with knowledge and skills required in your profession, Raise your bar and strive for the highest and what finally pays is your hard work and perseverance.’

Sahera Sumar- Global Sheroes, Coach and Consultant Sahera is a global leadership consultant, peace ambassador, coach, facilitator, speaker and now co-author. She calls herself a global citizen having worked in over 25 countries, including some remote and interesting places. Sahera’s mission is “women leaders for a better world” and so she has spent much of her professional time working with organisations to enhance their inclusive leadership pipeline, as well as working with women empowering them to realize their potential. Sahera is also an executive director for the UN Australian Association (NSW) where she stands for human rights and equity for all.

Having decided to jump off the corporate ladder after working in senior global roles, she took on the greater challenge and adventure of starting her leadership consulting firm and delivering programs in countries where she could have greater impact such as Nigeria, Tanzania, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. Sahera’s latest enterprise is Worldwide SHEroes, a leadership / mentorship platform whose social purpose is to connect women of diversity and disadvantage to global mentors .. so they can have the same leadership and economic opportunities. Worldwide SHEroes will be celebrating it’s first birthday around International Women’s day. Sahera’s advice to women is - ‘Shape your own path and when you align it to your purpose is when realise your true potential.’

In this difficult time we women need to come together, pull each other up and support upcoming talents. At Desi Australia we will continue to highlight our high achieving women, who are working hard and have become our role models.

On behalf of Camden Council, I would like to wish you all a very

May this celebration bring equality, harmony and friendship to our diverse communities.

HappyHoliFESTIVAL OF COLOURS

Councillor Therese Fedeli Mayor of Camden

Desi Sheilas

By Poonam Naik

This year instead of attending social events on International Women’s Day– It made more natural sense to ask our Desi Sheilas as to what empowers them? What is their definition of empowerment?

Empowered

Ifielded this question to different Desi women from all walks of life in different forums. The responses I received were varied and eye opener.

Shilpa Bhatia, a Property Consultant from Best Value

Real Estate Agency in St

Mary’s feels working in a male dominated industry makes her feel empowered. It gives her immense satisfaction and a sense of achievement at every house sold by her and at a book of happy clientele. Santhoshi Machanagari, a working professional from Penrith mentions women empowerment to her means financial independence, ability to make own decisions and positively influence others. Growing up in a conservative society, she elaborates she has seen many women were controlled by men even in financial spheres of life. She strongly believes having financial freedom and the ability to nurture their interests bring the real empowerment among women. She further states that women centric programs nurturing their interests eventually provide equal opportunities in business and corporate world.

Priyanka, another working professional from Penrith believes women empow-

erment is where women have the confidence in themselves and their abilities. It also consists of the acceptance of the fact that every individual is blessed with unique qualities, and they are all special in their own way specially women. She believes women should stop comparing themselves to others or measure their achievement on someone else’s scale. She feels empowered knowing that her competition is with no one else but in every moment uplifting herself.

Saba, an art entrepreneur from Western Sydney talks how motivation and encouragement are key stones to empowering any soul. Demotivating a gender in certain situations is not women empowerment. Financial stability achieved through skillsets to thrive and survive is a form of women empowerment. Women do better when they are in their own circles of trust and evolve along with mentorship. She mentions them as women’s empowering pool.

Workplaces need to be safe, secure, respectful, non-threatening, noncontrolling places to work. Women are not robots and not products, but human beings that don’t need labelling and objectification. For some of these things to happen, environment, old cultural beliefs and norms must change. Things will have to be shaken and stirred to change mind shifts and override current mental blocks. The constant idea of guardianship for women needs to be done away – snowballing from father/ brother to husband. Let’s also do away with unnecessary submissiveness and forceful mannerism and etiquettes of women being questioned away. Women will have to willingly water towards their own growth and empowerment as well. An important skill to learn in Australia is to learn to drive on roads. It is not just an important skill to get groceries or drive around the kids to different activities but may drive you out of the worst situation in your life.

So, desi Sheilas, do create opportunities for yourself instead of waiting for others to facilitate roads of empowerment for yourself. Learn to water your true spirits and that is 99% empowerment achieved.

Cumberland City Council would like to wish all those who are celebrating, a Happy Holi Festival.

MAYOR LISA LAKE COUNCILLOR SUMAN SAHA

Holi is a special time and most joyous festival in the Hindu calendar month of Phalguna, and celebrates divine and eternal love.

May this festival colour your life and bring you joy, wealth, love and celebrations and remove sorrow and sadness from your life. Best wishes to you and your families.

CUMBERLAND CITY COUNCIL 16 Memorial Avenue, PO Box 42 Merrylands NSW 2160 | www.cumberland.nsw.gov.au