Eighteen-year-old Reshma Quereshi shares her vast knowledge in achieving the perfect ‘beauty queen’ look in her series of make-up tutorials on video-sharing site YouTube.
She teaches her audience to confidently feel beautiful inside and out, from moisturizing their lips with lip balm to applying bold eyeliner.
On the other hand, her joyous smile also reminds Indians that cosmetic products designed to make women beautiful has the same price as sulfur acid, a substance used to “sabotage” 900 Indian women each year. Quereshi is one of the blameless victims of these perilous attacks.
According to beauty site Marieclaire.com, Quereshi’s brother-in-law threw sulfuric acid on her face while she was on a trip to Northern India. No reason was given for the attack but it left her left eye totally blind and her right eye severely infected. She also suffered facial burns and disfigurement and only cosmetic surgery can repair her face.
In every make-up tutorial, Quereshi raises awareness of this relentless violence by inviting viewers to sign the “Make Love Not Scars” petition that envisions to halt over-the-counter sale of liquid acid in India. Gianna Francesca Catolico
