look news india
After the Hema Committee report on sexual exploitation of women in the Malayalam film industry, now nineties heroine Soumya has created a sensation by accusing a Tamil film director of making her a sex slave. In an interview to a TV channel, Soumya said that the Tamil director tortured her physically and mentally. He also sexually harassed me in the name of entertainment. Soumya said that she would only reveal the name of the Tamil film director to a special police team formed by the Kerala government to investigate cases of sexual harassment in the Malayalam film industry.
Soumya said in this TV interview that at the age of 18, I was studying in the first year of college. I came from a secure family background and my parents knew nothing about films. When I was doing theatre in my college, an acquaintance of mine told me about an opportunity to act in a Tamil film. As a teenager I was fascinated by actress Revathi. She lived in my neighbourhood at that time. I was lost in the world of imagination and went there to give a screen test to the film director and his wife.
Saumya further said in this interview that being a young girl I did not know anything. They indicated to me that my family was forced to convince me to act. The director of the film told my father that a lot of money has been spent on its screen test. As a result, I had to agree to work in his film. Initially, he did not talk to me during outdoor shooting. We had an agreement that the director of the film would be his wife but all this was only on paper and in reality the director of the film was handling all the work. I was under his authority. He used to scare me into silence by showing anger. Being from a patriarchal family, I used to get angry quickly and I was constantly afraid of a person of my father's age.
Soumya told that one day when his wife was not around, he called me daughter and kissed me. Which shocked me. I wanted to tell this to my friends but could not. I did not tell anyone because I was ashamed that I had done something wrong. Slowly that man started taking advantage of my body. During one year when I was in college, he also raped me. Soumya said that even though the director called me his daughter, he sexually harassed me. It took me 30 years to recover from the guilt of my relationship with him. I encourage all victims to report this type of sexual abuse.