Shasvathi: Entrepreneur, Vegan and Proud

December 13th, 2022

Heart, soul and energy all bundled into one person, Shasvati Siva stands tall for veganism and open conversations about divorce. She freestyles through life, without overthinking the future, yet without oversimplifying it either. Life just is. It comes her way and she lives it in the best possible way she knows—adapting and evolving along the way. And accepting of herself and her journey with openness and forgiveness.

The hour long conversation on veganism, being an entrepreneur, divorce and Indian aunties and yes, a brief pause on Gilmore Girls, was fun, inspiring and provocative. The simple complexity in her way of living is infused in one word that might just be her mantra: normal. Divorce is normal. Veganism is normal.

And honestly, who defines normal anyway? Each of us do. Wishing you more power to do you, Shasvathi.

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Bhavani: Hello. There’s so much I’ve read online about you, but how would you want to introduce yourself?

Shasvati: Hi, I currently live in Bangalore. I've grown up in Chennai. Then lived in Bombay for about 15 years of my life, so equal Chennai as well as Bombay girl. I went vegan about 10 years ago. It was a life changing decision in many ways, because veganism goes well beyond diet. It affects every single aspect of life. It’s been absolutely wonderful. Also frustrating to be vegan in a sea of people who don't believe the same things or who can't see the blatant cruelty. I also talk openly about divorce as a taboo. It’s something I've been advocating for almost three and a half years. I'm writing a book. And I'm also a TEDx speaker.

Bhavani: It's interesting that you chose to introduce yourself as a vegan upfront.

Shasvati: I'm not ashamed to say I’m vegan, I'm proud. The word vegan comes with a heavy sense of judgement. It's been over a decade now so it doesn't affect me anymore. I've seen and experienced every reaction there is. It's not like I need to introduce myself as a vegan. If I walk into a room, someone will definitely say, oh you know she’s vegan or that vegan has come into the room.

Bhavani: Journeys into veganism can be different for each individual. What made you go vegan?

Shasvati: I started hearing a lot about veganism. My father was already vegan. I honestly thought he was losing his mind. How you will live without curd rice? How will you not have your coffee? I was that person to him. I was also really young, 19 years old, and didn’t understand. I saw a few videos of PETA about the dairy industry and I even visited a farm. At that point, I had two young dogs at home. One of the calves in one of the videos looked exactly like my black dog. It really affected me that there was little difference to an animal at home and that I didn’t even know I was causing so much harm and abuse to another animal.

Having said that, at that point of time, veganism was not seen. I found it extremely difficult to adjust with friends as I didn't know what to eat when I went out. I was also having a lot of withdrawal from not having chai. It was different then because there were no (ready) alternatives.

Bhavani: Was it a gradual or sudden switch?

Shasvati: My best friend and I went vegan almost together. We made a list of our most favourite dairy items to least. Then started cutting out from the bottom. We took a little bit of time and then, one day we decided, nothing doing we have to show better will power. As somebody who loved curd rice, chai, ice-cream, I thought if I could give up these things, then there are a lot of things I could do in my life.

Bhavani: Now there are so many options…

Shasvati: Today 40 to 50% of cafes have something vegan. That's because there are so many activists and people coming together to create that demand. And as I keep saying, we don't need a separate vegan menu, you need to only mark certain dishes as vegan.

Bhavani: What was the reason to start Cowvathi (Shasvathi’s vegan cheese and curd brand that is now defunct)? Was the driver to give options to vegans?

Shasvati: I never wanted to give an option to vegans. I was focusing a lot on the transitioning vegans, because that kind of struggle is the most difficult. I also wanted to target people who didn’t know about veganism. You will be surprised to know that vegans were a small part of my customer base.

Bhavani: It was going well, so why did you shut down Cowvathi?

Shasvati: The pandemic. It was too difficult to get boxes of perishables to people. I lost a lot of products, deliveries never made it to people, or were late, so cheese would have gone bad. I ended up having a difficult time. So decided to pause and take a break during the pandemic, wait for it to get better. I never got around to it, because I went back into marketing. I would love to have a co-founder. If that happens would definitely open Cowvathi again, it’s my baby. I was 25 or 26 years old when I started it. Cowvathi is India’s first vegan cheese brand. It will always be that whether it runs now or not.

Bhavani: I find the conversation you’ve started about divorce interesting. That you chose to speak out. What made you want to do that?

Shasvati: I knew how stigmatised I felt. When I got divorced, a lot of people said, forget about it, it’s just a bad dream. But how could I forget? It wasn't a bad dream. It was my reality for many years. I wasn’t going to succumb to people trying to shut me up. It’s about how people react when you challenge them with a lesser accepted decision. I started by posting on my social media which had a small following. Also, I did have to inform a lot of people. My wedding was really viral so I did want to put it out in public that I was divorced. I didn't want to keep quiet about it. Nothing to feel ashamed. I did nothing wrong. The response was phenomenal…so many women reached out to tell me, this happened to me, or I got divorced, and all this happened. The more I started talking to people, the more convinced I was that this is so stigmatised. That pushed me to go on talking about it to help more like me, to provide a space where people feel heard. That is when I started saying divorce is normal. I realised I had so much to say, so much to put out there. So many conversations helped me shape my thoughts on divorce. After that, one thing lead to another, I never thought about it or planned. And I’m extremely grateful for it.

Bhavani: In your TEDx talk, you spoke about waiting outside the court and how you realised you wanted to do something, build a support system for people, that you had your family and friends, but sometimes you need someone who has been thought a similar experience, to connect. You had an online group and then you met physically too, tell us more.

Shasvati: Yeah…we had physical meets in a few cities. It would be small groups or even one-on- ones. Then the pandemic hit and we went online. We would have Sunday Zoom meets and have a long list of people. Right now, there are 1200 to1500 people who have signed up to speak but that’s a big number, to have those many stories, so I could accommodate only 12 to 15 stories. The whole point is people coming together, sitting together and talking about their experiences.

Bhavani: Let’s talk about your book. I know it’s about divorce but anything else you can share?

Shasvati: It is a self help guide. It also collects a lot of stories. More like a collective because it's not just about me. When talking about divorce in the country, it has to include a lot more voices. It is a lot of different experiences, different opinions and expert advice as well. It is a self help guide about how you can navigate Indian society when dealing with something that is as heavily stigmatised as divorce.

Bhavani: It was interesting to watch your video with Teesha that went viral. Can you talk about that?

Shasvati: It’s one of the best projects I've done in my life. One of the reasons I did it, is to have real faces. I was talking about divorce for a long time but so many people, who spoke to me on dm (on social media), were behind the scenes. I didn't want to become the poster child for this. Felt a lot of people were willing, but needed that little bit of nudge to take that conversation forward. When we started 34-35 women were willing to put their faces. But a few got conscious after seeing the sensitivity of the script, we narrowed it down to 14 or 15. It ended up being a collaborative project between a lot of people. So much sisterhood formed in that WhatsApp group. The group still exists.
The video also did extremely well. It was picked up by a lot of publications. We won an award for the script. We wanted to reach more people, wanted the message to go out.

Bhavani: If you look at divorce, veganism, if you don’t play by society’s rules you are seen as extreme, radical…both make people uncomfortable…

Shasvati: When someone calls veganism extreme, I remind them they’re eating the internal organs of a sentient being. If my eating palak is extreme compared to you eating the liver of a pig then we have different meanings of ‘extreme’. Society is not used to it that’s why it’s (seen as) extreme. It’s just a new concept. Similarly with happy divorces or celebrating a divorce. When people tell me they are divorced I congratulate them. Please don't say I'm sorry, you don't know whether you have to be sorry or not. Give them like a good send off into the future of freedom.

Bhavani: How do you feel about your life so far? What are your plans going forward?

Shasvati: I love my life. Towards the end of my 20s, I had a lot of regrets. But in my early 30s I stopped regretting it completely. Because I feel I'm young. I was able to turn a difficult experience into a good thing for a lot of other people. That is the silver lining. If I could go back in time and undo all the pain I would. Since I can't do that, I've made the best of the worst. I'm happy aboutthat. I have a great set of friends, great family. I love my life. I’m excited about do more meaningful things that I'm truly passionate about. I swing in extremes. I'll find the next thing that catches my eye and heart and I'll pour myself into it. That’s how I work.