NEW YORK, Sep 1 2020 (IPS) - Eight years ago, and at the age of 11, Fuzia co-founder Riya Sinha decided to start the online platform for girls and women. Her story and Fuzia’s DNA are intrinsically wrapped around each other – and highlight how even in the age of feminism where women’s voices tend to be drowned out, a platform for them can become a global success.
Sinha in an exclusive interview with Inter Press Service explains that Fuzia, with 4-million majority-female followership, was started after she published a book.
“We wanted to give girls a voice. I had written my first book: Runaway Twins when I was 11 and sold it over Amazon and through the local Palo Alto bookstore, Books Inc. in the United States,” she said. “This got me into thinking that every girl, in each corner of the world, needs to be given a place to express and engage. Each has a story, and what better thing can there be other than providing them with a platform? This is why we launched Fuzia.”
The website, which started primarily as a writers’ club, has broken barriers in an age of so-called women empowerment but where men still outweigh women in their impact in the publishing world.
More than 80% of the 100 most popular novels were written by men, according to an interactive infographic by Wordery published in 2019. A year earlier, a study found that three leading literary publications devoted less than 40% of their coverage to women authors.
Other factors set boundaries for female writers. Women, in developing countries, but their hobbies and creative talents at the backseat focusing on building a family first, then a career, and lastly express her creative side. A piece, if published, is then scrutinized by society and family. The scene is a bit different in countries like the United States and Canada – but there, creativity is overshadowed by the prohibitive costs of publishing.
Like many institutions, the publishing industry stands accused of gender bias. Every year, Women in Literary Arts (VIDA) Count goes through literary journalism outlets and tallies the genders of the writers whose works are featured and reviewed in those outlets.
According to their most recent study, in 2015 books by women made up less than 20% of books reviewed in the New York Review of Books, 30% in Harper’s Magazine, 29% in the Atlantic, and 22% in the London Review of Books.
Fuzia, however, is breaking these barriers for women and has rapidly become one of the topmost ‘liked’ communities on Facebook.

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