'Divergent' star Ashley Judd to visit Kolkata

KOLKATA: Hollywood star Ashley Judd of “High Crimes” and “Kiss the Girls” fame will be making her maiden trip to the city. The “Divergent” star, who has always been outspoken against sexual harassment of women, will be attending an exclusive event in Kolkata on January 25. To a very select audience, she will be reading out a story from “River of Flesh and Other Stories: The Prostituted Woman in Indian Short Fiction”.
Judd, who is the goodwill ambassador of United Nations Population Fund, will be reading out Niranjana’s poignant “The Last Customer”, which tells the story of 16-year-old Kani.Judd’s selection of this particular tale is significant considering that she is primarily coming to India to attend the World Congress Against Exploitation of Girls and Women. The event is being organized by Apne Aap, a grassroots organization that empowers girls to resist and end sex-trafficking, and CAP international (Coalition for Abolition of Prostitution) in Delhi. The congress will be held between January 29 and January 31, with the actor arriving in India on January 23.
Ruchira Gupta, founder of Apne Aap, said: “Ashley is an Apne Aap goodwill ambassador. She has been on the advisory board of our NGO since it started. We are celebrating 15 years of our foundation with a huge world congress. It will be attended by more than a 100 delegates from across 30 countries. Ashley is coming down to Kolkata to talk about this congress, invite people to at tend and sign a global pledge to end sex trafficking of the last girl.” The last girl refers to a poor teenager who can belong to any marginalized group or caste.
Judd's Kolkata event, which is being co-hosted by Kolkata Gives Foundation, is expected to play a significant role in creating awareness of this. Apart from various city organizations, four girls from Kolkata's red-light districts will be going to Delhi to attend the congress. Five girls living in Kolkata's Munshigunj were featured in a film that was part of the “Girls for the Last Girl” project. There are plans to show this film, too.
Some years ago, Judd was in the news for saying that she was repeatedly summoned to hotel rooms, while filming “Kiss the Girls” in the late 90s, by an unnamed head of a rival studio and asked to watch him shower.
Recently, she hit the headlines for bringing up the issue of misogynistic cyberbulling of women in the tech industry.
In 2012, another Hollywood star, Ashton Kutcher, had gone with Gupta to spend a day in Delhi's Dharampur area, where girls who were victims of inter-generational prostitution reside. However, the Hollywood star hadn’t come down to Kolkata during that trip.