You’re not broken, you’re just stuck in habits that quietly keep your fat exactly where it is.
Because ‘healthy’ and ‘fat-loss friendly’ aren’t always the same thing. You can eat clean, home-cooked Indian food and still overshoot calories with oil, ghee, nuts, sweets, sugary chai, big portions of rice/roti, and constant nibbling. Liquid calories and weekend social meals quietly erase your weekday deficit. The fix is boring but effective: get a rough idea of your maintenance calories, track or estimate your intake for a couple of weeks (including oils, drinks, and snacks), and create a consistent, moderate deficit. Keep protein and fiber high so you stay full, and watch what happens over 4–6 weeks, not 4–6 days.
No. You need a calorie deficit, not a carb funeral. Carbs like rice, roti, idli, dosa, or poha become a problem when portion sizes are huge and protein and veg are tiny. Many Indians lose fat while still eating carbs daily by shrinking the carb portion, increasing dal/curd/lean meat/soy/eggs, loading the plate with vegetables, and managing added fats. Going very low-carb can help some people control appetite, but it’s optional and often hard to sustain with Indian food culture. Choose the lowest-carb approach you can actually keep for months, not days, and judge results by your trend over time, not by one strict week.
For most people, 0.5–1% of body weight lost per week is a solid, sustainable target. That’s about 0.3–0.9 kg per week for many, slower if you’re already lean, maybe a bit faster if you’re very heavy. Faster loss usually demands very low calories, which increases hunger, fatigue, muscle loss risk, and rebound weight gain. Lifting weights, keeping protein high, sleeping decently, and not doing insane cardio all help preserve strength and muscle while you lean out. Think in 8–12 week blocks, not miracle 2-week crashes, and accept that the goal is arriving with muscle and sanity intact, not just a smaller, weaker, exhausted version of you.