To Making Changes

The story first appeared in The Times of Bennett a student-led initiative of the Times School of Media
By Shambhavi Upadhyay.

In an age where children were making make-believe games, 7-year-old Siya Tayal decided to make a change. “I grew up in an extremely positive environment, where there was never a notion of, you will make a change and help others when you are older, that’s our biggest mistake to let them feel like there is an age to do good. Whereas in my family, everyone just told me to be good here and now, no matter what the age and that’s how my journey began,” she says.

Now 15, she is an active philanthropist and a young leader who has a bunch of non-profit initiatives such as Bee Nifty, an umbrella organization that she formed when she was 8 years old which provides a livelihood to women in rural Haryana by making recyclable bags. “Women constitute about half of the world’s population and there’s a quote by Greta Thunberg ‘Act like our house is on fire, because it is.’ and its true in this situation too, women all over the world face difficulties and no opportunity must be left to help them out,” Tayal said.

She has recently been working on an initiative called ‘I am Enough’ which aims to normalise bodies of all types and spread awareness about body shaming and eating disorders in a creative, inclusive manner. “I will tell you about how all this started. I was on call with my best friend and she just told me about how body shaming was a daily part of her life, of how she wanted to look a certain way and I realized I felt that too and that made me feel none of us are content with the way we look, thanks to unrealistic standards that the society sets for us. That was when I decided, you know what, I am enough, we all are, just the way we are. That’s how this initiative came about. I would like to think I have grown with this project, in a way where I have learnt to love myself and it’s an amazing feeling.”

Siya has been working with the United Nations for a long time now on various diverse projects and campaigns, “I don’t just have one side to me, I feel like I am emotional and at the same time I can be practical too, while body comfort is a more everyday topic, climate change is slightly more technical, but I feel for both of them equally, and that’s what helps me take part actively in such varying initiatives. I have had a very different and fulfilling experience working with the UN. I have learned so much and talked to and met so many different people. The best part is that you get to make a change, and I actually am having fun doing it!”

She further says, “Everyone has a little bit of ‘I want to change the world’ in them. Everybody feels like they want to save someone. I would just want to say that saving that someone is very important and very possible and it’s okay if that someone is you.”

Siya Tayal is an 15 year old young leader and philanthropist who has a bunch of initiatives like 100% Non Profit initiative- Bee Nifty, an initiative which provides income and livelihood to women in rural Haryana by making recyclable bags!. She has spoken at UN, Geneva and she is a youth Ambassador under 1m2030 (a UNITAR and Global Challenges Forum initiative). She has won The India Volunteer Award, Pramerica Bronze Award and has been nominated for Kurt Han Prize 2020. She is the youth speaker for Internet Governance Forum for an event of UNDP. The event was to take place in Poland in the coming November but will now be conducted online. She has also collaborated with UNITAR and is now an educator for sustainable development. At present she is the social media manager and director for Artem NexGen. These are some of the marquee initiatives under this regular school girl's sleeves.

(The report has been written by Shambhavi Upadhyay , a first year student of BA ( Journalism and Mass Communication) of The Times School of Media)
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