Her Kajal Won't Smudge is a podcast about South Asian women who are pushing back on desi social norms through art, content, dance, music, film, and more.
We ask every guest: What does feminism mean to you? In South Asian spaces, the word “feminist” is still linked to promiscuity, selfishness or a rejection of family values. We want to unpack that.
Our guests remind us that feminism isn’t one thing. It’s a way to be your fuller self, have voice, choice, and power in a culture obsessed with “what will people say?”
Social norms aren’t fixed. We create them, which means we can rewrite them too.
Mythili Prakash - Through my dance practice, I want to blur the lines between a Goddess on a pedestal and a human woman
In this episode, Shana is in conversation with renowned Bharatanatyam dancer, Mythili Prakash.
Bharatanatyam is one of India’s oldest dance forms. Through distinctive hand gestures, movements and facial expressiveness, its dancers convey ancient stories from Hindu texts. In performing these stories, we also perpetuate patriarchal social norms about a woman and a goddess’ place.
Mythili’s choreography probes these norms, rewriting ancient stories and writing new ones in which women are represented in their full humanity and without the need for a pedestal.
Follow us on Instagram @herkajalwontsmudge (https://www.instagram.com/herkajalwontsmudge/) and check out our website.www.herkajalwontsmudge.com (http://www.herkajalwontsmudge.com).
Follow @mythiliprakash (https://www.instagram.com/mythiliprakash/) on Instagram.
CREDITS:
Host and Creative Director: Shana
Head of Visual Design: Minal Jadeja (https://www.instagram.com/meansbaa)
Visual Designers: Akshat Agarwal (https://instagram.com/art.akshat), Shaumik Kanvinde (https://www.instagram.com/shaumik_k)
This is a Maed in India (https://www.maedinindia.in/) production
Head of Production: Mae Mariyam Thomas (https://www.instagram.com/maemariyam/?hl=en)
Project Manager: Shaun Fanthome (http://www.instagram.com/sfanthome)
Producer: Ruchi Sawardekar (https://www.instagram.com/ruchi_saw/)
Junior Producer: Quoyina Ghosh (https://www.instagram.com/quoyina/)
Sound Editor & Mix Engineer: Kartik Kulkarni (https://www.instagram.com/kartik.kulkarni/?hl=en), Lakshman Parsuram (https://www.instagram.com/february_31st/), Nihar Temkar (https://www.instagram.com/nihar_temkar?utm_source=ig_web_button_share_sheet&igsh=ZDNlZDc0MzIxNw==)
9 Apr 2025
Zara Suhail Mannan - We deserve to be free here as much as our male counterparts, this is my Pakistan too
Zara Suhail Mannan is Shana’s guest on this week’s episode of Her Kajal Won’t Smudge. Zara studied English at Yale University. After Yale, she could have sought out the best-paying corporate job she could have found, but instead Zara returned to Pakistan to teach at an all-boys underprivileged school. By day, she taught, presenting as a man, and mentored young boys and, by night, she was one-half of a glittery, sparkly, pop band called Mystical Shayari. It all came to a head when Mystical Shayiri did a photoshoot, glammed up, in front of a monument to the founder of Pakistan, Quaid-e-Azam Mohammed Ali Jinnah.
Next came online trolling, death threats, arrest, TV shaming and more. But what Zara has won in the process is truly a testament to the force that she is. Let’s just say, she set the record straight about what it means to be a Pakistani and she continues to live this activism through Kitab Ghar, a public library truly open to all.
Follow us on Instagram @herkajalwontsmudge (https://www.instagram.com/herkajalwontsmudge/) and check out our website www.herkajalwontsmudge.com (http://www.herkajalwontsmudge.com).
CREDITS:
Host and Creative Director: Shana
Head of Visual Design: Minal Jadeja (https://www.instagram.com/meansbaa)
Visual Designers: Akshat Agarwal (https://instagram.com/art.akshat), Shaumik Kanvinde (https://www.instagram.com/shaumik_k)
This is a Maed in India (https://www.maedinindia.in/) production
Head of Production: Mae Mariyam Thomas (https://www.instagram.com/maemariyam/?hl=en)
Project Manager: Shaun Fanthome (http://www.instagram.com/sfanthome)
Producer: Ruchi Sawardekar (https://www.instagram.com/ruchi_saw/)
Junior Producer: Quoyina Ghosh (https://www.instagram.com/quoyina/)
Sound Editor & Mix Engineer: Kartik Kulkarni (https://www.instagram.com/kartik.kulkarni/?hl=en), Lakshman Parsuram (https://www.instagram.com/february_31st/), Nihar Temkar (https://www.instagram.com/nihar_temkar?utm_source=ig_web_button_share_sheet&igsh=ZDNlZDc0MzIxNw==)
2 Apr 2025
Kirat Assi (Sweet Bobby) - What happened to me was not just catfishing, it was online entrapment
Our guest this week is Kirat Assi, a popular radio personality who was catfished over a nine year period. What began as a long-distance friendship with Bobby Jandu, a man she knew through her tight-knew community, turned into a controlling and coercive relationship that took over Kirat’s life. Kirat never met the man she spent countless hours chatting with because that Bobby simply did not exist. His identity had been stolen. To our absolute surprise, the catfisher turned out to be Kirat’s closest confidante during this entire ordeal, her own female cousin.
We might just be the only podcast that delves deep into the social norms that shape this story.
Was Kirat gullible? Or could this have happened to any one of us, with the right/wrong circumstances?
Follow us on Instagram @herkajalwontsmudge (https://www.instagram.com/herkajalwontsmudge/) and check out our website www.herkajalwontsmudge.com (http://www.herkajalwontsmudge.com).
Read more about Kirat’s story on her website. (https://www.kiratassi.co.uk/)
CREDITS:
Host and Creative Director: Shana
Head of Visual Design: Minal Jadeja (https://www.instagram.com/meansbaa)
Visual Designers: Akshat Agarwal (https://instagram.com/art.akshat), Shaumik Kanvinde (https://www.instagram.com/shaumik_k)
This is a Maed in India (https://www.maedinindia.in/) production
Head of Production: Mae Mariyam Thomas (https://www.instagram.com/maemariyam/?hl=en)
Project Manager: Shaun Fanthome (http://www.instagram.com/sfanthome)
Producer: Ruchi Sawardekar (https://www.instagram.com/ruchi_saw/)
Junior Producer: Quoyina Ghosh (https://www.instagram.com/quoyina/)
Sound Editor & Mix Engineer: Kartik Kulkarni (https://www.instagram.com/kartik.kulkarni/?hl=en), Lakshman Parsuram (https://www.instagram.com/february_31st/), Nihar Temkar (https://www.instagram.com/nihar_temkar?utm_source=ig_web_button_share_sheet&igsh=ZDNlZDc0MzIxNw==)
Reach and audience
Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.
YouTube views
1,927
Score snapshot 15 Sept 2025
Apple Podcasts (US)
4.6 / 5
22 ratings
Spotify
5.0 / 5
25 ratings
Podcast Authority Score: 74 / 100
A composite of feed quality, social presence, YouTube performance and engagement. Read the methodology.
Quality
70
Social presence
94
YouTube
74
Engagement
77
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