Sarees, Kurtas Move Priyanka Chopra At Harvard Business School

BOSTON, MA – Actress Priyanka Chopra Jonas was seen turning emotional as she addressed students at Harvard Business School during an India Week session.

The actress was heard speaking about how immensely proud she felt seeing an auditorium full of young students dressed in sarees and kurtas. She added that she was excited to know that her daughter Malti Marie has “all of them to look up to.”

Priyanka posted, “So, this is how my day started. I was supposed to give a fireside keynote address with one of my closest friends and business partner Anjula Acharia, to conclude India Week at the prestigious Harvard Business School. The topic was ‘The India We Imagine’… no big deal, I thought. You can do this, Priyanka.”

However, she revealed that looking at the audience changed everything for her.

“But looking out into the audience today, I only had one thought — You are the India I imagined. Let me explain,” she added.

Speaking at the session themed “The India We Imagine,” Priyanka reflected on her own experiences while studying in the US years ago as a teenager.

Recalling those years, she spoke about feeling like an outsider. “When my 12-year-old self landed in a high school in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, and subsequently at Newton North High School in Massachusetts in the mid-90s, there were not many who looked like me.”

Priyanka also expressed her thrill and surprise at seeing so many Desi faces at an international university. She said she never imagined that decades later she would be addressing a packed hall at Harvard.

“I would have never imagined that in 30-something years, I would be speaking to you — the future of our culture, our world — on this stage, in this iconic chamber, where so many incredible people have not only spoken, but where so many leaders of the world as we know it were born. The audience was packed… and we were Desi… and Desi allies,” she shared.

“It made me want to cry, because this is not what my teenage experience looked like. But I’m so happy that you get to have it. We all stand on the shoulders of the generations before us. I’m so excited that my daughter will have all of you to look up to.”

Expressing pride at seeing representation at one of the world’s top institutions, she wrote, “To see an auditorium full of students, dressed in sarees and kurtas at the campus of HBS (@harvard) in Boston, Massachusetts, where I grew up… to see so many people from my community at one of the best schools in the world, made my heart burst with pride. You are the future.” (IANS)