This is Life

Yesterday for no particular reason, I watched Shahrukh and Mahira’s starrer Raees movie song. It had all the ingredients which a typical Shahrukh songs contain, a beautiful heroine with long flowing dupatta or a sari pullo, and of course Shahrukh himself.

Shahrukh Khan and Mahira

 I felt that with him, Indian film industry is on the verge of losing its last batch of ‘Heroes’. Let me explain what I mean by this, I grew up at a time when Indian films slowly started to make a big impact on Pakistan’s society, culture and households through their films released on video cassettes. Besides my family, the people I saw every weekend at my family get-togethers were Amitabh Bachchan, Dharmendra, and Shashi Kapoor.    

Amitabh Bachchan and Shashi Kapoor

Left to Right: Amitabh, Dharmendra, Sanjeev Kumar & Amjad Khan

Till today the images of these heroes/ stars are engraved on my mind and for me the terms ‘good looking and handsome’ are defined by these actors. The senior actors like Amitabh Bachchan had grace, style, chivalry and special quality of being a film hero which cannot be defined in words. Shahrukh, Salman, Amir Khan and Shaan (Pakistan Film Actor) are the last batch of these stars/ heroes genealogy. 

Shaan

Stars/heroes might have changed, but one thing that remained constant is the female actors, and the conditions and attitudes which they have to endure. Parveen Babi was a very successful actress but she went through the hell of physical abuse and molestation by the powerful men around her. Unfortunately, this is not the case only with film actresses but it is something which common women also face.

Parveen Babi

Physical abuse is not only the problem of working women but it is also a grave issue with girls studying in schools and universities, housewives living in joint families. Not every joint family has such craziness but there is vast majority of families where women are harassed by the men in the house.

Research has shown that such offenders fall into the category of socio-paths, their mode of operation begins with creating an environment of trust and respect around them, leading to abnormal niceties, which ultimately makes them very popular with everyone. Once the confidence is built, slowly these offenders began to show their hidden personality by way of subtle and coveted insinuations and gestures towards their intended victim accompanied by inappropriately touching of hands, or patting on back, touching their fingers.

Sometimes it also takes place through obscene jokes at family/ friends parties specifically when women are around, or even through indecent pictures and jokes in emails and phone messages sent by a dear relative. Most of the time, women gets confused when harassing advances are made towards her because she is not physically attacked, rather what she feel is extreme anxiety, embarrassment, discomfort and confusion.

Of course, they are directly, indirectly carefully warned not to speak about this to anyone, why? Simply, because no one will ever believe her, or will take her word against him. Women are harassed by both outsiders and insiders: their family members, bosses, teachers, who take advantage of them due to the powerful position they hold. 

Regrettably, in such cases women have no one to go to, they cannot share this with their fathers, mothers, brothers or husbands as it might get terrible backlash from them, and result in discontinuation of their studies or other dire consequences like getting blamed as the cause and instigator of such advancements.

I wanted to write about this for a long time but had no idea how to start and take up this sensitive subject. What I intend to do is inform my readers about sexual/ physical harassment, so a space can be created at home, schools, colleges, and workplace where the victim can at least talk to someone fearlessly. My objective is to provide tools to detect and cure this disease at the initial stage.

Although I have made this article centrally focused on young girls and woman but even boys are not spared from this horrific behavior. However, the ratio of a female victim is comparatively higher than male victims.

It is always better to talk than hold our peace.

Have a great evening,

Sonya Syed (Day 567)