Sujata V, 51, is a psychotherapist based in the US. In the early 1990s, she went by the screen name of Soumya, a teenager who acted in one Tamil and three Malayalam films, Poochakkaru Mani Kettum, Advaitham, and Neelakurukkan. In September 2024, 32 years after she left the industry, she spoke of how she was groomed by a Tamil director to be his sex slave. She is now successful in a different profession, but she misses acting.
An actor who requested anonymity spoke of why she chose to quit the industry sometime in the mid-2010s. She had worked in 10 Tamil and a few Kannada films and was repeatedly asked to “compromise”. Her male co-star in a Tamil film, a leading hero of the time, would follow her home, and after she rejected his overtures, he inserted a “kissing scene” in the film without her knowledge. When she refused to do the scene, she was thrown out of the film and targeted by a slander campaign. She has a successful alternative career today, but she misses acting.
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During the #MeToo movement in India in 2018, the singer and voice-over artiste Chinmayi Sripada accused the Tamil lyricist and poet Vairamuthu of molesting her when she was a teenager. It had taken her years to process the incident and speak up. Few voices in Tamil cinema backed her. She lost assignments and was banned from the Tamil Nadu dubbing union by its male head, Radha Ravi. Since then, she has hardly sung a dozen songs in Tamil although she has a few hits in other languages. She misses singing and dubbing in her mother tongue, Tamil.
Sujata, now a psychotherapist based in the US, once acted in Tamil and Malayalam films. | Photo Credit: By SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT
“This is the impact I wanted. I wanted people to know we can speak, that we have a voice, even years after something happened.”
At around the same time, the actor Sruthi Hariharan complained that the actor Arjun Sarja had misbehaved with her during rehearsals for the Tamil movie Nibunan. She became the target of a witch hunt. When researching this story, other women actors told this writer that the man in question is indeed a repeat offender, but at that time Sruthi’s rising career in Kannada was cut short because of the power and reach of the man she named. After a long winter, it is only recently that Sruthi is finally getting the roles she deserves.
These are just four cases from the Tamil and Kannada film industries. Despite the assurance of anonymity, some women this writer spoke to still fear retribution, but they confirmed that abuse is rampant. A senior publicist from the Tamil industry said that “manhunters” check the family background of potential victims. “There is invariably a drunkard father or brother in the picture.” The abusers tap into this vulnerability. “The girl soon finds herself doing something out of sheer desperation,” he said.
Now, after the release of the Hema Committee report in Kerala, there is a surge of optimism that there will be a cleansing in the film industry in Tamil Nadu and Karnataka too, and that rules will be put in place. Much of the abuse stems from the fact that filmmaking is still a largely unorganised business. Only some production companies put in place effective systems; smaller units cannot afford it. Most stakeholders Frontline spoke to demanded that all production houses set up an Internal Complaints Committee (ICC) and declare their sets to be POSH (Prevention of Sexual Harassment) compliant.
The film industry is a banyan tree that feeds allied fields such as television and YouTube, besides magazines, newspapers, and digital media. Abuse takes place in these places too: in interviews and programmes where misogynistic and scurrilous statements are made; in panel discussions where actors’ lives are torn threadbare; and on stage where lewd comments are passed. While doing a report for The News Minute website on the Malayalam film industry, the writer Nidhi Suresh was asked by the actor John Vijay, an accused in the #MeToo movement, if she had “ever been naked with any man”. At music audio release functions, people like the veteran producer K. Rajan, the former stunt master Jaguar Thangam, and the actor-cum-“journalist” Bayilvan Ranganathan have been seen slandering women actors.
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Aditi Anand, co-founder of Neelam Studios along with the film director Pa. Ranjith, told Frontline that a POSH committee was one of the first things they set up. People were trained to follow guidelines and help create a gender-neutral space. “It is something we feel strongly about. It was not hastily cobbled together,” Anand said. “I think it improves company culture and the ability to hire and retain female employees who want to work in a non-toxic and safe environment. We try to have posters and information everywhere on how to contact the ICC. It’s there on call sheets, contracts, inside restrooms.”
Highlights
- There is a conspiracy of silence around the sexual harassment of women in the Tamil and Kannada film industries.
- With the release of the Hema Committee report in Kerala, that may be about to change.
- More women are now speaking up about abuse, even incidents that happened years ago.
One of the reasons why a POSH committee has its work cut out in cinema is that the line between work and after-work is very thin. People working on a film can share accommodation, travel together to locations. The challenge of the guidelines is not just to punish transgressors but help create a better work culture. Anand said: “We are yet to get a complaint at Neelam Studios. But does that mean no transgressions took place? No, just that we need to encourage those who suffered to come forward and complain.” As one survivor said: “As an actress, you are polite, and you smile and laugh it off if you wish to have a career.” This can only change when all women on a film set know that their complaints will be heard.
Aditi Anand, co-founder of Neelam Studios, said a POSH committee was one of the first things the company set up. | Photo Credit: SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT
“We are yet to get a complaint at Neelam Studios. But does that mean no transgressions took place? No, just that we need to encourage those who suffered to come forward and complain.”
A producer who came to work in Chennai said that she sometimes wonders if she made a mistake to work in the south Indian film industry. “It’s a huge culture shock for those of us who come from elsewhere. For starters, I am not used to so few female colleagues on the sets. Certain things take place that cannot be counted as harassment, but they make you uncomfortable. We stick around because this is where good films get made.”
The Nadigar Sangam, a union for film, television, and stage actors in Tamil Nadu, has appointed the actor Rohini as chairperson of its ICC. A telephone number to register complaints was sent out a few years ago, and some cases were resolved, Rohini said at a recent press conference. The same exercise is being repeated now, with email addresses added. “As in Mumbai, we should move to a system where every film has an ICC with its number clearly displayed. That gives women the confidence to come forward and complain. That we are there to back you.”
Asked if the rule would apply to actors who misbehave outside the sets with outsiders such as journalists, she said it ideally should. Rohini made another important point. “Survivors need empathy. They need to be told we are sorry it happened to you. Empathy changes how we see a survivor.” Directors are often wary of removing someone from the film even after a harassment complaint, simply because they are talented. “I recently put my foot down and said we cannot work with one such person. Gender politics is as important as personal politics,” said an ICC member, requesting anonymity.
Problems in Kannada film industry
In the Kannada industry, women actors are sometimes the only women on some sets. Female technical crew are few in Kannada and Tamil films, as are female assistant directors. Pooja Sudhir, who signed up as an assistant director fresh out of college and now works as a writer with the actor-director Rakshit Shetty’s Paramvah Studios, told Frontline that she has had a decent run in the Kannada industry as far as safety and self-respect goes. “In our production house, our moral compass is the same for all. We tend to behave the way we wish to be treated. A call is always made to confirm that our women crew have reached home safe.”
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According to Rakshit Shetty, while there are no specific dos and don’ts, even newcomers know the Paramvah culture. “Hierarchy does not matter; only creative inputs do. So, the power equation is straightaway removed from every interaction,” he told Frontline. As Aditi Anand said, the only remedy is to have more women in positions of power.
“I am seeing some signs of change now in how complaints are handled. A survivor’s need for anonymity is being respected.”
Sruthi Hariharan
Actor
The National Award-winning actor Sruthi Hariharan is finally back in the world of movies. Online, and sometimes offline, she is still judged by the fans of the actor she complained about, and she relies mostly on silent support to keep her spirits up. “It is very difficult for a woman to have her story heard with empathy and sensitivity. I am seeing some signs of change now in how complaints are handled. A survivor’s need for anonymity is being respected,” she said. “While every woman knows there will be a backlash, I did not expect it to be this huge. In hindsight, I understand why my friends in the industry could only check in on me privately. I understand their fear.” The film industry is close-knit, with the perpetrator and the woman he targets often sharing common friends. Few are able to take a stand.
The Kannada film association FIRE (Film Industry for Rights and Equality, set up in 2017), of which Kavitha Lankesh is chairperson and Sruthi a member, has requested Chief Minister Siddaramaiah to set up a committee, led by a retired judge who has worked on gender justice, to investigate working conditions and suggest measures to ensure workspace safety. Sruthi said: “I believe the industry requires an assessment to understand how deeply ingrained harassment and abuse is. Over the past few days, there have been a lot of contradictory statements about whether it exists at all and to what extent. We all need to work to make the industry better and safer for all.”
Chinmayi Sripada, singer and voice-over artiste. Her work suffered and she faced trolling after she spoke up about harassment. | Photo Credit: By SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT
“I do not want my truth to be erased by others. I will keep repeating my story till I am heard.”
Chinmayi’s work suffered enormously after she complained, and she endured severe trolling. She persists because “I do not want my truth to be erased by others. I will keep repeating my story till I am heard.” She filed a complaint with the National Commission for Women, but nothing came of it. Chinmayi said that any new rules should factor in a support system for survivors. “We didn’t know any of this before complaining. No one trained us to file complaints. We did not know about defamation cases, legal ramifications.” Chinmayi’s biggest disappointment is how her co-singers in the industry reacted. “I would have forgiven silence but not their attempt at erasure. I still play the scene back in my head. My mother is outside speaking to Vairamuthu’s wife. I am in his room to sign a voucher or something. There is a table there. He came towards me, and I froze. Did he think that was consent?” To those who told her she could still sing in other industries, she replied: “I can sing anywhere, but this is my home. You are asking me to leave my house.”
Even those who wanted to give Chinmayi a chance at the time were stopped. The director P.S. Mithran wanted her to dub for the actor Kalyani Priyadarshan in his 2019 film Hero. “I was told by the dubbing coordinator that Chinmayi had moved to the US even though she was in Chennai. The Dubbing Union said if I used her voice, it would not send other artistes. I used Chinmayi’s voice, nevertheless. This unofficial ban is criminal,” Mithran said.
‘I wanted people to know we can speak, that we have a voice’
The second actor this article began with told Frontline that she found herself shutting down as a human being and living in a state of constant defensiveness. “I was always anticipating some sort of an attack; it affected my creativity.” She is still very angry about what happened. “People did not get to see enough of my work or my scope because men in positions of power did not allow me to work if I did not agree to their control.”
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When Sujata’s interview with her aunt, the actor-director Lakshmy Ramakrishnan, was aired, other women came forward to speak about their experience, even if anonymously. “This is the impact I wanted. I wanted people to know we can speak, that we have a voice, even years after something happened,” she said.
Her abuser was her mentor and guardian. She continued attending college during the entire year of her abuse. “I had no idea of my rights. My mind blocked out the rape, the blow jobs…. It was at the age of 39 that my former husband made me realise that I had not been in a relationship with my perpetrator but had been abused. Only recently did I remember that the director had once shoved a rod into my vagina, suggesting it would be pleasurable for me.”
“I don’t think in those days I could have complained even if I wanted to. Whom would I complain to?” asked Sujata.
It is this circle of silence that has encouraged men in film industries across regions. A silence that gives them power. Perhaps the Hema Committee report will finally break it.
Subha J Rao is an independent journalist based out of Mangaluru, Karnataka. She writes about Tamil and Kannada cinema.
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