Saturday, December 13, 2025 | 06:50 PM ISTहिंदी में पढें
Business Standard
Notification Icon
userprofile IconSearch

South India's film industries are on the cusp of their #MeToo moment

Women in South India's film industries are speaking up and banding together to protest decades of rampant discrimination and abuse

Photo: PTI
premium

Photo: PTI

Nikita Puri
In a television interview recently, the BFFs with Vogue host Neha Dhupia asked her guests, actors Rajkummar Rao and Radhika Apte, to talk about “bizarre jobs” they did early in their careers. Rao talked about doing bit parts in commercials. Apte said, “I did South Indian films. They pay you well, but you b****y deserve it.”

The conversation then veered towards gender inequality, particularly in South Indian cinema. She recounted how, on her first day on the sets of a Telugu film, the actor, a man she didn’t know well, started tickling her feet when she was lying down for