BENGALURU: “I am proud of my daughter. I want to tell people, don’t stop fighting. I as a child went through it but kept quiet. Today, as a woman I say, don’t take it from any man. You have a beautiful chappal, use it.”
That was Kannada actor Sruthi Hariharan’s mother speaking impromptu at ‘
We the Women
’ conclave held in the city on Sunday.
Sruthi’s mother was called on the stage to comment on how her daughter’s outing of an actor affected their family. “I asked her to stop fighting because of the impact it had on her career and her family,” she said.
The panel discussion, One Year of #MeToo, sought to gauge the impact, if any, that the movement has ushered in.
Moderated by journalist Sandhya Menon, the panel, besides Sruthi, featured playback singer Chinmayi Sripada and theatre person Angela Mondal, who recently accused an actor of raping her.
Answering a question about what women complaining for the first time must expect, Chinmayi said: “Be prepared to be disbelieved.”
In fighting her case, Sruthi admitted to having moments where she wondered if it was worth it. “You can deal with abuse online, you can deal with the slut shaming but what hurt me was to be referred to only as #MeToo girl after six years of putting in hard work into my career. It is not easy,” she said.
“I sleep with no guilt because I didn’t keep quiet. I sleep with the hope that he will think twice before he attempts to do that to another woman,” Sruthi said.
The conclave on Sunday saw women achievers from diverse backgrounds — former foreign secretary Nirupama Rao, Olympian swimmer Nisha Millet and social worker Bhanwari Devi, among others — getting together to share inspiring stories from their lives.
I am just a girl who is ambitious: Sara Ali KhanWho is the real Sara Khan? That was the pointed question journalist, writer and hostess of the conclave Barkha Dutt asked the actor in the panel titled, A Spark Called Sara.
“I am just a girl who’s ambitious. I went to New York to do my undergraduate studies in Columbia College. I don’t believe in a universal moral code. You do you, but I think that if you believe in something you must stand up for it. Hypocrisy angers me,” she said.
Sara admitted to body issues being a real problem. “There is a pressure in the film industry to look a certain way. But because I was heavy for the longest time, I grew up deriving confidence not based on how I looked. You need to remind yourself that you alone have the agency to live the life the way you are.”
Commenting on the cons of her privileged background, she said, “There is drawback with any kind of privilege. There is intense scrutiny and there are people who are waiting for you to stumble.” The actor believes that change in gender equation in society has to first start at homes. “It has to start with the mother who favours her son,” she said.
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