Did the recent viral “Indian Baddies at Tyla” reel really end South Asian diaspora or just expose the fickle definitions of Indian beauty around the world?
For a brief, delirious moment on TikTok and social media last month, the internet behaved like it had just discovered fire. Or melanin. Or both. A short video of Indian creators and models dressed fashionably attending a Tyla concert blew up across feeds. Comments followed in predictable waves: awe, thirst, disbelief. “Why didn’t I know Indian girls were this hot?” “I owe South Asian women an apology.” “This just ended the South Asian diaspora.” A viral marketing moment that turned the world’s eyes on Indian women and cracked open the long-standing fabrication that Indian women’s beauty needed Western approval. The virality wasn’t about Tyla (and her Indian heritage) or the hot girls attending the concert. It wasn’t even about their outfits or the choreography or being Indian. It was about the algorithmically enforced recognition and what that reveals about how beauty, race, and desire have historically been policed through the years. As Diipa Bhuller Khosla, founder of indē wild and the brand behind the viral video, puts it plainly: “Indian women didn’t suddenly become beautiful, I think it’s just that the world is now finally paying attention.” That sentence alone should end the discourse. But of course, it won’t. Here’s our deep dive into what defines Indian Beauty in 2026.
The Indian beauty that was and the impact of colonialism
The history of Indian beauty before it was defined by idealists, dates to historical accounts and old scriptures. Marco Polo’s observations on Tamil Nadu that suggest darker skin was early on even revered in Indians in certain areas. Even the ancient sculptures showed proof of appreciation for Indian women. These traditional Indian beauty standards often mirrored the form of the Indian goddesses, with prominent features like large eyes, long dark hair, and body proportions, that shaped the original perception of Indian beauty. Before colonisation flipped the script – there were stories of princesses and queens who’s beauty far exceeded that of mortal human beings. But since the invasion, the Indian beauty standard has been tinged by Western ideals – namely the promotion of fair skin – an offshoot from the country’s skin, a legacy of colonialism that linked European features to superiority. The colonial rule created a deep-rooted colourism in India which was further amplified by media and marriage markets, post that. The Colonial rule in India imposed unsaid racial hierarchies, equating the colour of one’s skin with power, and white supremacy. The ingrained colourism favouring lighter skin persisted even after independence through films and advertising, featuring lighter-skinned actors, and promoting the fair-skin ideal through skin-lightening products and campaigns
Reclaiming the narrative
In 2026, Indian beauty is reclaiming the global narrative. In just the last few months alone Katseye’s Indian origin Lara Raj and her sister Rhea Raj have taken over the internet, Indian model Bhavitha Mandava has made headlines as the first Indian model to open for Chanel, and the nail in the coffin – the Indian Baddies at Tyla blowing up. And suddenly, the world is wondering if Indians are in-fact – beautiful? But the framing of this moment as a “South Asian glow-up” is lazy – and wrong. For decades now, Indian women have been hypervisible in some ways and erased in others: fetishised, exoticized and yet thought of as lesser. Brown beauty was allowed only in fragments hair oil ads, yoga aesthetics, mystical side characters, or the occasional ethnic exception who could pass Western standards with enough contouring.
Despite the mid-90s seeing Sushmita Sen win Miss Universe in 1994 and Aishwarya Rai, Miss World 1994 making India the only country to win both of the biggest beauty pageants in the world. Followed by a range of back-to-back pageant wins on the international stage by Diana Hayden, Yukta Mookhey, Priyanka Chopra, Lara Dutta, and Manushi Chhillar amounting to the most consistent pageant winner from any country – somehow, ‘Indian beauty’ never translated to the world for what it was. Until now – and all it took was a viral TikTok video. What TikTok did was remove the buffer. No casting director. No editor-in-chief. No luxury brand creative director deciding whether a brown girl felt “aspirational enough.” Social media didn’t try to teach the world Indian women were attractive, the world just finally happened to see it for what it is. “For a long time, global beauty standards were shaped by a very narrow lens, and South Asian women were either exoticised, sidelined, or boxed into stereotypes,” notes Khosla.
But why now?
“What’s changed now is visibility, confidence, and who gets to control the narrative,” she answers.
Control is the operative word here. Because beauty has never been neutral it was and has been cultural capital. And historically, South Asian women have been denied access to it not because they lacked beauty, but because acknowledging it would disrupt the hierarchies built upon aesthetics. In a hyper online era of social media awareness – Indian beauty has finally, reclaimed the narrative.
Why the internet is ‘shocked’- and is it a good thing?
The shock says more about the viewer than the viewed. Many people encountering the “Indian baddies” moment – namely the Gen Z – have been raised on a steady diet of media that taught them that desirability looked a certain way: Eurocentric features, light skin. South Asian women to even this generation of chronically online, hyperaware internet folk were either invisible or comic relief. The diaspora internalised it too, learning to soften accents, straighten hair, brighten colour. So, when today’s Indian women show up unapologetically and breakout onto the global views – the internet just short-circuit the script. “When Indian women are seen being joyful, glamorous, and fully themselves, the reaction is inevitable, even if it’s long overdue,” Khosla notes.
Ask ten people today what “Indian beauty” means, and you’ll get ten different answers. That multiplicity is exactly what Indian beauty stands for at its essence. “Indian beauty, to me, is a lot of things. It’s not one look, one skin tone, or one aesthetic,” Khosla says. “It’s the confidence to take up space, the ease of being both traditional and modern, soft and powerful, glamorous and grounded…and often all at once.”
Are Indian women finally baddies in 2026?
The idea that this moment “ended the South Asian diaspora” isn’t entirely true. But what it has done is add a crack in the shell of lies and a long-built inferiority complex. The validation that Indian women and beauty has received over the year isn’t liberation. If Indian beauty only matters when it trends, when it’s cosigned by pop culture, when it fits into bite-sized virality then the hierarchy hasn’t fallen it’s just temporarily distracted.
But what this moment has taught us that the world has finally caught up – in more ways than one – to Indian beauty. The real shift is still quietly underway and being sustained. In 2026 it does look like Indian women are no longer waiting to be discovered. Because, as this moment proves, discovery was never the problem – awareness was. And once that door opens – even if via a TikTok reel at a Tyla concert – it doesn’t really close again.
This story first appeared here.
Note : The information in this article is accurate as of the date of publication.