Actress opens up about a casting couch encounter

Varalaksmi Sarathkumar is a Southern Actress who has appeared in various Tamil, Kannada and Malayalam films. She marked her debut in 2012 with a Tamil film Podaa Podi where she portrayed a London based dancer. For this role she won a Vijay Award and Edison Award for the best debut actress. Since then she has appeared in three more films and is currently filming four.

Going by this description one may infer that she seems to have grabbed a foothold in Indian Cinema and is fairly establishing herself in show-business. But she too claims to have an embarrassing ‘Casting couch’ encounter in an emotional letter posted on her Twitter page.

For those of you not aware, Casting couch is a term used to denote trading of sexual favours at a workplace in return of an entry into the workplace or an advancement in the same. There have been many instances of such a practice being rumoured to be true especially in show-business. Bollywood too has had an history with the same with both men and women getting affected by the same. But the women seem to have been a much bigger victim of the same due to the society still objectifying them.

When faced with the harrowing experience Varalakshmi decided to speak up in the hope that more awareness is spread and the society starts treating women in a better way. This is what she tweeted out yesterday:

Hemant Bijapurkar: Contributor at OpIndia.com, Wish to write a great trilogy someday!