LAST month, Anita Rani attended a red-carpet event wearing a dress she knew would make quite a statement.
With its risqué thigh-high split and one side held together only by a few strategic stitches at the hip, the gown by designer Rick Owens was a world away from the wax jackets and wellies of BBC1’s Countryfile.
But it was what that dress represented for Anita herself which made it so powerful.
“I just feel really different,” she says.
“In the past, something in me would have just gone: ‘Oh no, I can’t wear that,’ but now I’m like: ‘Why the hell can’t I wear it?’
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“I’m a woman who’s worked her arse off to become who she is, so I’ll wear whatever the damn well I like, and I’m going to love it!
“I always knew I’d get to my 40s and become who I wanted to be.
“It’s when I‘d start blossoming.
“I’m going to get sexier as I get older.”
This shift in mindset is no coincidence.
There’s a deeply personal reason behind Woman’s Hour host Anita’s renewed sense of self – or her “awakening” as she puts it.
Earlier this year, her 14-year marriage to tech company owner Bhupi Rehal, 42, ended, and the last few months have undoubtedly been full of emotional upheaval.
But as the dust settles, Anita, 46, is emerging with defiance – she’s fizzing with energy, stronger and more confident than ever before.
Today is her first interview since the split, and she says there’s huge relief in the news finally being out in the open.
“It’s liberating that people know that I’m single now.
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“Not everything works out and things come to their natural conclusion, and that is absolutely fine.
“There’s no shame attached to being single and living your best life in your 40s.
“I want all women to know that I’m on the other side now.
“There is light, and the light is good!
"I’m single, I’m child-free, I’m in my mid-40s and I have never felt better, sexier, more powerful or more excited about the future.
“I’m exercising my choice to do what the hell I want. And that feels very empowering. I’m stepping into chapter two.”
Which means?
“It means being unapologetic.
“It means not being afraid to own my space.”
As she’s readjusted and learned to adapt to her new life, it’s other women she’s drawn strength from.
When she needed them most, Anita’s squad rallied.
“My female friendships have been so important.
“I went to Glastonbury with Woman’s Hour this summer at a very poignant moment in my life.
“I had a group of the most amazing women with me, and it was exactly what I needed at that time.
"We were all just loving life and owning it and it felt so good.
“I’ve learned that, although the friends you’ve had since childhood are really important, you will also meet other women at different points of your life who represent who you are in that moment.
"I’ve got a network of badass women who all know who they are.”
Is she back on the dating scene yet?
“Let’s just say I’m happy being single at the minute!”
The split might be recent, but it was perhaps the culmination of what Anita describes as a “process of change”, which has been ongoing for some time now.
It’s a journey that began eight years ago with her episode of the BBC genealogy documentary series Who Do You Think You Are?, where she uncovered the story of her mother’s father, whose first wife and children died in the violence of Indian Partition in 1947, while he was stationed in the Anglo-Indian Army thousands of miles away.
Her journey continued through to July 2021, with the release of her searingly honest, bestselling memoir The Right Sort Of Girl, which explored her wrestle with identity growing up as a second-generation Indian in ’80s Yorkshire, desperately trying to navigate the space between two often clashing cultures.
Although Anita doesn’t want to discuss exactly what led to the breakdown of her marriage, the last few years have been a time of self-discovery, forcing her to reassess both her past and her future.
And it’s been liberating.
“Liberating is the word,” she nods.
“Learning about my history, getting older and writing a memoir makes you think about your life.
“Let’s call it an ‘awakening’.
“A big change has happened in my life, and it’s not happened for me to then revert back to old habits.
“So I’ve now got an opportunity to live my life the way I want to.
“I’m not going to do what’s ‘expected’ of me.
“I’ve grown up with warrior women who’ve had to put up with lives where they’ve not had much choice.
“So I feel very lucky to be the master of my own destiny.
“I get to pick and choose what I want to do now, so I’m booking flights, meeting up with friends, going out and soaking up art and culture.
“I want to go away at Christmas – I’m not sure where yet, but I love the idea of just sticking a pin in a map.
“I can go wherever I want.
“It feels like a new lease of life and a very powerful time. Bring it on.”
Anita likened the process of writing her memoir to therapy as she revisited her difficult teen years and issues around self-harm, puberty and body image.
It also saw her confronting uncomfortable truths about her “dysfunctional” Punjabi family, including her paternal grandfather’s violent temper and the struggles of the women she saw trapped in “a system that bound them, strangled them”.
Writing it was one thing, but publishing it for the world to read was quite another.
She admits that at the eleventh hour, the nerves kicked in and she panicked that she’d peeled back too many layers and revealed too much.
“The night before it went out, I phoned a good friend and mentor and said: ‘I can’t believe
"I’ve written this. I don’t want it to go out. What have I done?!’
“He asked me how I would feel if I’d written a bland book about a girl who moved to London, and I said: ‘Well, I’d think it would have been a wasted opportunity.’
“You have to put yourself out there.
"Particularly me, because of what I represent.
"It was important to say something meaningful after spending such a long time not talking about who I am and my identity.
"My mum had said: ‘Write it for me, write it for the women who can’t speak. Say all the things we never felt able to.’
“So it was telling my story, but it was also about talking to the girls who see themselves in me, and explaining what it means to be a brown woman growing up in Britain.
“There are children in every corner of this country who believe they don’t have access to certain places, and they need to know that they can do it.
"That’s what the memoir was about – and also to say I’m just as messed up as everyone else!”
More than 20 years after starting out on her broadcasting career on Channel 5’s entertainment show The Edit, Anita has risen through the television and radio ranks to become a fixture on Countryfile and, since 2021, the thrice-weekly host of Radio 4’s iconic Woman’s Hour.
It’s a peach of a job, and one she still has to pinch herself over.
In between that, she found time to reach the 2015 semi-final of Strictly Come Dancing, pen her debut novel, Baby Does A Runner, which was released this summer to critical acclaim, and she’s also just launched her own jewellery collection with British brand Carrie Elizabeth.
Anita has never been afraid of hard graft, but while she is instinctively laser-focused and determined, she insists there had never been a strategy for success in place.
“There’s never been a plan,” she admits. “But younger me always thought the world was her oyster.
“Before I left Bradford, I honestly believed that I could do whatever I wanted.
“There was no part of my mind that put any limitations on what possibilities were out there and I still feel the same today.
“Now I find myself at the most exciting part of my life so far and I’m just having fun.
“I think 16-year-old Anita would look at me and say: ‘Oh my, you’ve got your dream flat, you’ve got a great wardrobe and you’re living the life you always wanted.’”
Instilling that same hope and self-belief in the next generation is something Anita is fiercely passionate about.
Back in March, she was made the University of Bradford’s Chancellor and immediately set to work on creating the Rani Scholarship which, every year, will see four girls from disadvantaged backgrounds funded through higher education.
“I’ve always wanted to provide access to higher education for young women, because I know what it did for me,” she says.
“I was the first woman in my family to go to university and it absolutely changed my life in so many ways.”
This is why a percentage of the sales from the new jewellery range will go directly towards funding the scholarship.
“It feels like the stars are in alignment, because it all ties in really nicely.
"We’ve called the collection Shakti, which loosely means ‘divine feminine energy’.
“In Indian culture, shakti is something we all have within us.
“I love jewellery, and I love how powerful it makes women feel.
“I’m so proud that we’ve managed to design such a beautiful collection of pieces.”
It is, she says, “another string to my bow” – something else to focus on as she hurtles towards the new year.
Does she get reflective around this time?
“This year I will, definitely,” she replies.
“I’m very positive and forward-thinking, but I also want to be honest with myself.
“I love this time of year anyway, when everything gets twinkly and magical with Halloween, bonfire night, Diwali and the run-up to Christmas.
“I’m really excited about next year.”
And there’s one thing in particular that is top of her wish list for 2024.
“Well, I don’t have my own TV show yet,” she says.
“There’s so much I want to do… so, yes, let’s put that out there!
“I deserve to be here. And I always say the best is yet to come.”
- The Carrie Elizabeth X Anita Rani Shakti jewellery collection is available now (Carrieelizabeth.co.uk).
