Canadian Body Positivity Influencer Megha Thakur Passes Away at Age 21

Megha Thakur was a breath of fresh air in a social media world that can leave much to be desired. In a medium where users are constantly bombarded by toxic messages, to find an oasis in that desert was rare.

Megha was more than a TikTok star. She was a salve to the cuts that often come from existing in a world that's hyper-focused on looks. She approached body positivity with humor and hope.

Sadly, it was recently announced that Magha had passed away at the age of 21. Here's what we know about Megha Thakur's cause of death.

"It is with heavy hearts we announce the light of our life, our kind, caring, and beautiful daughter, Megha Thakur, suddenly and unexpectedly passed away on November 24, 2022, in the early morning hours," wrote Megha's parents in a touching post on her Instagram. They went on to almost eulogize their daughter's short but impactful life.

"Megha was a confident and independent young woman," they shared. "She will be dearly missed. She loved her fans and would have wanted you to know of her passing."

They then asked for blessings from her fans as well as "thoughts and prayers" for her "onward journey." Their announcement was met with shock and sadness, with people in the comments section unable to believe the news was true.

As of the time of this writing, her cause of death has not been revealed. However, in a TikTok from July 2022 Megha talked about having such severe anxiety that it led to a heart attack. She took a sizable break from social media after the health scare. One user expressed her condolences saying she hoped Megha was OK, to which she replied, "Thank you. I've been taking the time for my mental and physical health and love ya'll so much for still being here."

Megha's TikTok account boasted nearly 1 million followers with her videos amassing over 32 million likes. Since she began posting in 2019, her subject matter primarily revolved around body positivity. Hilariously, Megha was best known for embracing her "flat butt," as she called it. "My butt's too small to fit in any of my pants, but I'm still gonna wear 'em," she said in a TikTok voiceover from December 2020.

Born in Canada and from Indian descent, Megha also touched on learning to appreciate her skin color in a sea of whiteness, such as in the TikTok below where she discusses being "conditioned to live up to Eurocentric beauty standards." In it, she tears up while urging everyone to love their own skin color. "I'm looking at myself now and I'm like 'Your skin color is so pretty,'" she said.

Naturally, Megha often had to deal with trolls, but she approached them as she approached life: without fear. On March 3, in an Instagram post, she addressed what that looked like.

"People always ask me how I deal with hate, and my answer always is there is nothing to deal with," she wrote. "At the end of the day, I’m the one that has to live with myself, so the only opinion of myself that truly matters is my own."

What a powerful legacy to leave behind.