Indians Set Up Virtual Community In Toronto
When Manisha and Sandeep Bawa were planning their wedding, the dearth of advice centres became a business opportunity to put up MyBindi.com, a website that's been long in coming to Toronto despite the region being one of the largest concentrations of South Asians in the world

By Ela Dutt
eStart Correspondent
TORONTO, June 07 2000- When Manisha and Sandeep Bawa were planning their wedding, they could not find any one place for advice. They turned that into a business opportunity putting up MyBindi.com, a website that's been long in coming to Toronto despite the region being one of the largest concentrations of South Asians in the world.

"It has had an amazing reaction specially from youth," Manisha told eStart. Manisha is a fresh business graduate and Sandeep (Sandy) an engineer. Being interested in the internet and being married, "We married the two elements." Being South Asian and youth and knowing there was no one place they could go to find out what was going on in the community, the two conceptualised MyBindi to meet the needs of the rich and vibrant community numbering close to 500,000.

South Asians are the fastest growing ethnic group in Toronto with higher-than-average levels of education and income. Despite the fact that they are among the most advanced on-line users in North America, until recently, Toronto's South Asian community had very little presence on the web.

Within the first three weeks of its existence starting Feb. 1 this year, the site was featured on Yahoo Asia as a website of choice calling it an "excellent resource" and "fine piece of inspiration" for people planning their weddings. That same week, MyBindi was highlighted on a South Asian Portal Indian Index for its "pleasing colours, interesting articles...and a fun place to hang out for just about anybody."

After three months, the site is attracting over 100,000 hits a week - and the numbers keep on growing. As well, the site grows continually in terms of the depth and interactivity of its content, the founders contend. While the majority of visitors come from Toronto and the rest of Ontario, a significant minority (15% - 20%) visits from US and international cities. Site demographics reveal that the average visitor is 27 years of age with at least an undergraduate degree.

MyBindi is a content-based site focusing on South Asian lifestyle in Toronto. Major content areas include weddings, arts and entertainment, upcoming events and community resources. The wedding planner is the most popular part of the site. This section includes a month-by-month planner, mehndi patterns, proposal stories and information on religious and cultural customs.

Local events, artists and culture are at the forefront of the site. "We don't try to be everything to all people..." says Manisha said. "The beauty of the site is its intimacy - it's people, places and events that you know...everything is just around the corner."

Finally, the site provides interactivity. Users may listen to music clips, download movie trailers and participate in contests and opinion polls. Most importantly, the Mybindi bulletin board provides a platform in which to share experiences, voice opinions and topics such as sexuality, inter-generational conflict, religion, racism and arranged marriage are featured among the ongoing discussions.

The Bawas also co-sponsor South Asian arts and festival programming with organizations such as Dristi, the Bata Shoe Museum, Desh Pardesh and the University of Western Ontario. This has given them the opportunity to be paired with other alternative and multicultural media.

On conceptualising the idea of MyBindi, Manisha and Sandy approached a close friend Charles Smid, a graphic artist, who instantly agreed to join in.


Dated : [ 07 June, 2000 ]