We want to be seen, heard, respected and paid

Diet Paratha is the IG community celebrating South Asian talent - and its founder Anita Chhiba is intent on change, as she explains to Joe Bromley

- Joe Bromley

I HATE Diet Prada," says Anita Chhiba, to my surprise. She is the 32-year-old founder of the spin-off Instagram community Diet Paratha, which champions South Asian creative talent globally. "I just think cancel culture is the devil. My whole concept is flipping the script from cancellation to celebration."

For those unaware, Diet Prada is an Instagram page with 3.3 million followers, and acts as a fashion industry watchdog by calling out brands and celebrities for bad behaviour and copying each other's designs. Most famously, it caused the cancellation of Dolce & Gabbana's 2018 Shanghai fashion show by publishing racist text messages allegedly sent by co-designer Stefano Gabbana.

But Chhiba, who is New Zealand-born of Gujarati Indian descent, is not about aggression. Her 2017-founded counter-site, whose flippant name swaps the Italian brand for traditional South Asian flatbread, is a visually rich moodboard, introducing often little-known artists, designers, models and musicians to its 44.4k-strong fanbase.