by Zanita Careem

Nelum is a self-motivated individual, marked by her single-minded quest for success and achievement.She is breaking stereotypes with her talent, and inspiring countless women. Nelum’s strong determination to be independent, influenced her to be an entrepreneur. A fashion icon, who makes statements in any outfit at any place.

Nelum Haththella is the founder and editor of “Brides Of Sri Lanka” magazine, the premier bridal and wedding magazine is Sri Lanka. A graduate of Edith Cowan University, Australia with a Bachelor’s degree in Communications and IT, Nelum started exploring her many talents from a very young age.

As the daughter of film producer Florence Haththella, she acted in films and teledramas as a child and moved on to modeling for TV commercials. At the same time she also explored her writing skills and won Young Writer of the Year in 1995 for her poetry. Soon after graduating, she got married to Viraj Rajapakse, a pilot and moved to the Maldives, where she worked as a manager for an IT and software development firm.

05Upon returning to Sri Lanka for her confinement, she completed a Diploma in HR and soon after formed her publishing company and hence the birth of Brides Of Sri Lanka, HealthWise and Mangalyaa. She proved her excellent entrepreneurial skills she inherited from her mother when she won Woman Entrepreneur of the Year in 2015, in the medium business category.

With such accolades, this inspiring lady is still continuing her explorations of talents and is now using her spare time to share her passion for food and travel via Food & Travel Escapades by Nel – a Youtube channel and social media blog. She uses this platform to share her exquisite recipes, food reviews, travel destinations with videos and photos.

How did your business come into being

I founded my company in December 2006 with the website www.bridesofsrilanka.com which was designed to bridge the gap between Wedding Planning and Technology. At the time, the use of the World Wide Web for planning a wedding was novel to Sri Lanka, but was widely embraced by young tech savvy couples. They found the features of my website to be time saving and extremely useful; especially the prospective brides and grooms living overseas. Then six month later, I decided to release a printed version of the website in a magazine form (Brides Of Sri Lanka magazine), which too became a favorite among brides and grooms. And ever since, we’ve been growing and now are proudly onboard Sri Lankan Airlines, is the media partner for reputed wedding expos in Sri Lanka and overseas and the two-time Gold Winner at the Sri Lanka Print Awards (2019 & 2020). We are also the only wedding magazine available for worldwide readership on all digital media platforms including Magzter, Online, Android & iOS Apps.

A few years ago, we also released Mangalyaa, a wedding magazine to satiate the Sinhala readership.

What has been the best and hardest thing about being an entrepreneur

There best things would be how I am able to create job opportunities to many and empower them with my expertise and knowledge, how am I able to aspire many youngsters to follow their dreams and venture into businesses and mostly importantly how I am able to be a part of the success story of my clients who are our advertisers.

The hardest thing would be to decide when to take a break, as you can get quite addicted to doing what you love.

Your passion and advise to young entrepreneurs

My passion is to be of help to others. My advice to young entrepreneurs is to start business with innovative ideas and products which makes you unique and indispensable. As a youngster, it is very easy to get carried away with what your heart believes in and overrule what your head tells you, but if you whole-heartedly believe in your business model, don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. Be persistent, resilient and take every hurdle as a learning experience. You are the only one standing your way to success!

Can woman have it all? Share your takes on this

Of course a woman can have it all! The biggest mistake most people make is think that being a woman is a disadvantage to becoming successful – on the contrary, women by nature are gifted with far more better characteristic such as endurance, resilience, tolerance, empathy and ability to multi-task, to name a few. Woman or man, having it all totally depends on how badly you want to have it all and what you are going to do about it.

What do think of women in sri lanka how do you think it can be better

I think of Sri Lankan women are extraordinary creatures – especially if you look at our history, we’ve had some remarkable women. We’ve had the first woman prime minister and president in the world; so we really can’t say women are oppressed or lack social representation in this country. If we stand our ground for what what we believe in, we are definitely heard. Sadly, however, I feel women in this country don’t maximize their potential due to various reasons. Most often they end their careers to prioritize family soon after marriage making them depend on their husbands for financial support. And funnily enough, most often it is women who encourage women to do this and make them feel that it is a woman’s duty to give up their dreams and careers for the family’s sake. The duty of maintaining the wellbeing of the family has to borne by both husband and wife, not wife alone. As long as we don’t change the mindset of people to treat a woman as an equal in marriage, we will not develop as a nation! We need to empower our daughters with education and financial independence. It is only then a woman can live with her head held high and never have the reason to feel inferior to any!

With so many magazines around what is that thing which separates your magazine from others

Novelty and the use of modern technologies from graphic design, pre-press to printing. Over the years I think we’ve mastered it to the point our printer won Gold twice consecutively at the Sri Lanka Print Awards for Brides Of Sri Lanka magazine in 2019 and 2020 in the magazine and periodicals category. We’ve always been trendsetters and kept ourselves far ahead of competition, because our challenge has always been to better ourselves from where we are.

Why a bridal magazine?

A wedding in Sri Lanka is a greatly celebrated milestone in one’s life. And I know the dilemmas I faced as a young bride when I was planning my own wedding many years ago. Wedding planning period is a very trying time for a young girl as she is new to the whole experience and is caught in a web of opinions of parents, relatives, friends and wedding professionals. I wanted the best information resource for such young brides where they are guided to choose the most unique ideas and best vendors to plan their most memorable day. And with our international exposure, I am able to showcase the great talents we have in Sri Lanka to the rest of the world, making our island nation the best wedding destination.

Your husband’s role in supporting you

Right after God, he’s my go-to for advice, support and help. Being the youngest of four, I was very strictly raised by my mother who was a young window. I always say I earned my freedom the day I got married. Viraj and I started our  courtship at a very young age and he’s become my best friend. He extremely supportive and believes in everything I do and that has given me the utmost freedom to do take up any challenge or risk without fear. It is very important to find a life partner who embarks on life’s journey, not in front of you or behind you, but right next to you, holding your hand along the way.

Courtesy: Outfits by Aslam Hussein of GeeBees Designer

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