Actress Swara Bhaskar has, in a scathing comment on Padmaavat, said she felt like a "vagina only" after watching the Sanjay Leela Bhansali directorial. However, some film fraternity members dismissed it as a "feminist debate".
Bhaskar believes Padmaavat has brought up the question whether women — widowed, raped, young, old, pregnant, pre-pubescent — have the right to live.
In an open letter published on The Wire, a news website, late on Saturday (27 January), Bhaskar has decried glorification of self-immolation customs Sati and Jauhar.
She began her note by congratulating Bhansali for being able to release Padmaavat despite the hurdles — something she says she even fought trolls for on social media.
The actress, who played a small part in Bhansali's Guzaarish (2010), watched Padmaavat "first day, first show", and decided to share her concerns.
"That's what I felt like at the end of your magnum opus. I felt like a vagina. I felt reduced to a vagina-only. I felt like all the 'minor' achievements that women and women's movements have made over the years - like the right to vote, the right to own property, the right to education, equal pay for equal work, maternity leave, the Vishakha judgment, the right to adopt children... All of it was pointless; because we were back to basics," she wrote, while adding, "We were back to the basic question — of right to life. Your film, it felt, had brought us back to that question from the Dark Ages — do women — widowed, raped, young, old, pregnant, pre-pubescent... do they have the right to live?"
She stressed: "Women have the right to live, despite being raped sir. Women have the right to live, despite the death of their husbands, male 'protectors', 'owners', 'controllers of their sexuality'... whatever you understand the men to be. Women have the right to live - independent of whether men are living or not. Women have the right to live. Period. It's actually pretty basic," referring to the "very uncomfortable" climax scene in which actress Deepika Padukone (Rani Padmavati in Padmaavat) leads a pack of women to commit self-immolation after attackers venture into their kingdom and kill the men.
"Women are not only walking talking vaginas. Yes, women have vaginas, but they have more to them as well," she said.
Bhaskar said she was hopeful that Bhansali would offer some sort of a critique of Sati and Jauhar in the film.
The daughter of well-known strategic analyst C Uday Bhaskar and professor of film studies Ira Bhaskar, signed off the letter as "Swara Bhaskar, Desirous of Life".
Her lengthy post did not resonate well with actress-singer Suchitra Krishnamoorthi, who tweeted: "Aren't these feminist debates on Padmaavat rather dumb? It's a story ladies - not an advocacy of Jauhar for God's sake. Find another battle for your cause - a real one at all. Not historical fiction."