Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry and narrow-mindedness, said Mark Twain. Priyanka’s teens were spent in various cities and towns of India because of the nature of her father’s job. This not only taught her to accept a new beginning every couple of years but also gave her a window to people from various beliefs and values. These movements made the foundation for regional and cultural contextualization of her thought processes.
She studied science at school and then hopped into business management and gathered herself a prolific career in marketing and communication over 20 years in local and global organizations. Eldest of the three sisters, she was raised to be sensitive and perceptive. Somewhere along the journey, making quiet observations and listening became a part of her personality. Storytelling consequently came to her quite early as way of life. Partly because of the atmosphere at home that inducted her to Urdu poetry, and the influence of her grandparents through her adolescent years; besides her own love for insights and expression.
Her uninterrupted conversations with her father laid the foundation of the woman she was to become. Their talks in their small-town-big-houses with relocations every few years brimming with observations of the world are fairly visible in her blogs and then her first book, My Jiffies – narration of moments, unadulterated and unpackaged.
The other two key contributors to her flair for storytelling have been her grandmothers – both maternal & paternal. Her Mataji (father’s mother) would tell little Priyanka bedtime stories, a new one every night by diktat, which single handedly set her basics into Sanatana Itihasa. This is what lends to her writing a very distinctive, erudite and endearing expression and resulted in her second book Mahadevi – the unseen truth behind existence.
Her Biji (mother’s mother) would meet her once in few years and tell her ever awe-inspiring tales from her own life. Her influence revealed to a young Priyanka the complex thing life is, as also the transience of life, bringing in a certain gravitas in her storytelling. To sample the taste, read Bhuvaneshwari part II from Mahadevi.
In her husband she found an ‘intellectual-courter’ and the dialogues only became richer with world history, politics, business and spirituality. Adding to all this Priyanka’s work-life was about drawing observations and deriving correlations for business, fostering a perpetual spectator in her. This aptitude eventually changed everything for her. Two decades of corporate life and a book later she decided to write full time.
Priyanka is a perpetual observer, explorer who writes about society, love, relationships but mostly a mythology activist who endeavors to separate myth from mythology. She believes accurate communication is the plinth for most of what goes right in this world. As also the lack of it is the cause for most of what fails.
Recognitions
Indira Priyadarshini Award 2023
By Indian Youth Congress in tribute to the indomitable spirit and impactful contributions reminiscent of the visionary leader, Indira Gandhi
Times Power Icon 2018
For exemplary contribution in corporate communication and advocacy
Outstanding Alumnus Award
From PIMR, DAVV, Indore for 19 years of prolific career in Corporate and Brand Communication for brands in APAC and Middle East
