Founder of Menstrupedia Aditi Gupta on challenging menstrual stigma

When Aditi Gupta got her first period at 12, she had no idea what menstruation was. Instead of being educated about the process, she was told to keep it a secret. Our biology teacher skipped the chapter on puberty and periods later in school. "I felt like I had committed sin," she recalls.

Menstrupedia founder, Aditi Gupta, was clueless about menstruation when she got her first period at 12. While working on a college project with her now husband Tuhin Paul, it hit her that she knew close to nothing about menstruation. The realization eventually culminated in Menstrupedia, a comic designed to fight the period stigma.

In 2012, when Aditi left her cushy job to focus on Menstrupedia, she had a clear vision in mind. Period education was severely lacking in India, and most awareness campaigns were focused on menstrual hygiene and product distribution. With Menstrupedia, she redirected the conversation by promoting culturally sensitive educational tools on the menstrual cycle.

The first batch of girls who learned from Menstrupedia have themselves become menstrual educators now. Aditi has managed to create a self-sufficient community with Menstrupedia and is eyeing new goals now. “We want to fix the broken sex education scenario in India,” Aditi says.

It is commendable that Aditi along with her team has managed to sustain a financially lucrative business while aiming at social change with Menstrupedia. It is this conviction that has enabled Aditi to catch the pulse of the problem and leave an indelible mark on the menstrual education sector. In a candid chat with POPxo, Aditi talks about her experience with menstrual stigma and how it fuelled her to start Menstrupedia.

Before the day actually starts, I spend a lot of quality time on myself and training my mind. Tuhin and I go to the office together with our 3-and-a-half-year-old son and I start by finishing the biggest task in my to-do list because that is when I am the most energetic.

Work calls follow this and then I devote a good amount of time to new products and campaigns. The second half of the day is generally lighter work and I like to spend time with my son. You quit your cushy job to start Menstrupedia.

We started Menstrupedia because of our personal experience of the menstrual stigma. It was the story of millions of girls in India who suffer due to menstrual taboos and myths. As for Tuhin, it was only during his Masters that he actually learned about the discomfort that a woman feels during menstruation. My biggest learning has been that period of education remains largely unexplored.

We made Menstrupedia for the Indian audience but the fact that the same version of the book is locally printed in eight diverse counties is proof that so much needs to be done in terms of period education across the world. Menstrupedia actually changed the paradigm. For the first time ever, it proved to people that it was possible to talk positively about periods.

Ten years ago when Menstrupedia did not exist, there used to be a lot of negative conversations around menstruation. With Menstrupedia, we empowered people to initiate that conversation. What is happening right now is that those girls who read the book back when we first started have become menstrual educators.

So the turning point has been partnering with Tuhin for that classroom project, turning it into a research project and full-fledged company, and growing it at a time when we were told that something like this is not going to work in India. This quality of learning unlearning and re-leaving has helped me a lot. This has helped me become very sensitive to a topic that was taboo In India.

It helped me package menstrual education in a way that it could really be accepted. At the end of the day, you deserve to have a good life but also you need to put all that surplus money back into the business and create more innovative solutions, leave a legacy, and leave this world a better place. Don’t fall for the fallacy of creating an impact without making a good business model.

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