MUMBAI – More than a decade ago, actor Mallika Sharawat shocked theaudience with her uninhibited expression of sexuality on-screen, but shesays the image came with a price as people, including directors andco-stars, thought she would easily “compromise”.
Mallika, who shot to fame with Murder in 2004, became synonymous witheverything bold on-screen. The actor says this image became a point forpeople to pass judgements on her character.
In an interview with PTI, Mallika says, “There were so many accusations andjudgements on me. If you wear short skirts, kiss on screen then you’re afallen woman with no morals. Men tend to take liberties with you. Thishappened with me too.
“I was thrown out of projects because heroes would say ‘why can’t you beintimate with me? You can do it on screen, what’s the problem in doing thatwith me in private?’ I’ve lost so many projects. It’s very reflective ofthe society, what women deal with in our country.”
The 41-year-old actor says she was aware that her film choices wereunconventional and believes she could have done much better if she “wasn’tswimming against the tide”. “I’m a very headstrong woman, I can’tcompromise. I’ve a lot of pride and self respect. There were times whendirectors have called me and said ‘come to me at 3 am.’
“I was so scared to talk about it because I thought they are going to blameme, that I must’ve behaved in such a way that prompted the director to saythis. There is that victim blaming mentality which exists in our societyand I always felt scared to talk about these things.”
The initial phase of her career was interesting for Mallika as on one hand,her stardom was on the rise but on the other, she constantly felt beingjudged for her choices.“When people judged me, it made me very insecure,overtly critical of myself and question everything I did. It’s not ahealthy space. At that time, a large section of the media was antagonistictowards me. They were always interested in sensationalism, which hurt me.
“My story, where I come from and what I battled, was overlooked, and it wasall about how many kissing scenes I had. It made me insecure because Ithought I had so much more to offer. But there was only one aspect of minebeing highlighted and I really suffered because of that.”
She recalls a national TV interview with a senior journalist who asked her“horrendous, overtly sexual questions” but no one came to rescue. “I cringewhen I watch it today. I had just begun my career, ‘Murder’ had releasedand I was so intimidated by this lecherous old man. There was no supportfor me, I felt so lonely, that was so painful.”
Mallika has shared one of her “traumatic” experiences on ZEE5’s The Story,a web series which chronicles real life incidents of actors.The episode,which recently went online, features the story of a crazy stalker fromHaryana who tried to kill the actor before the police nabbed him.
“He used to tell me, why do you wear short skirts, you’re giving Indianculture a bad name, why can’t you wear sari. I thought why are you tellingme what to wear and is this an invitation for you to misbehave with me? Ithought, ‘let’s do this episode’, even though it was traumatic to relivethat again. In the episode we talked about self defence. I had to put mystory out there,” she adds.