Chinmayi Sripaada/Instagram

It’s been almost a year since Chinmayi Sripaada, award-winning singer and dubbing artist, accused influential Tamil lyricist Vairamuthu of sexually harassing her. Since then, she has been banned by the Tamil film industry’s dubbing union, given some relief by a Chennai court, lost many job opportunities and been trolled online. But through it all, she has been indefatigable in her pursuit of justice, not just for herself but for thousands of other survivors. Not only does she engage with her online harassers with wit and sarcasm—“because this is not the way to speak to me and there are girls and women who are watching”—she also organises solidarity meets offline to bring together women from different walks of life and advocate for safer workspaces. In a phone conversation with HuffPost India, Chinmayi spoke about what she has learnt in the past year, where she gets the energy to keep fighting and why she thinks art and the artist cannot be separated. Edited excerpts from the interview: It’s been a year since you spoke out about your experience of sexual harassment in the Tamil film industry. What has a year of publicly fighting sexual harassment taught you? SIGN UP FOR THE DAILY BRIEF FROM HUFFPOST INDIA Get our top news delivered to your inbox every morning, Monday to Friday. Newsletters may offer personalized content or advertisements. Privacy Policy Newsletter Please enter a valid email address Thank you for signing up! You should receive an email to confirm your subscription shortly. There was a problem processing your signup; please try again later Facebook

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Flipboard CLOSE One of the things it has taught me is that however difficult the going feels, one has to be relentless and it is not at all easy. And I knew this when I walked into it, naming a man who’s politically backed like Vairumuthu. He has the Tamil nationalistic pride thing also going, he has all these Tamil nationalists wanting to back him because he speaks for the language and it doesn’t matter if he’s molested how many ever women. And the general power circles that be, the men that can actually take a stand, have this conundrum and I don’t blame them for it—whether they separate the art and the artist. This is a question we have to keep asking over and over. I do believe that the art and artist can’t be separated, because if it’s just about the art, then take away his name, na? Don’t give him credit. Put some other name. If that’s okay, then why ever not? We, at some point, have to as a society not allow these men to perpetuate the cycle of abuse and allow these men to retain the very power that they have used to abuse women. This is a stand that men in power also have to take because they are the ones holding money, holding power (right now), and the power to make decisions and most of the time they are propping each other up and patting each other’s back.

At the same time, I do know that there have been men in the Tamil industry who have taken a stand and very publicly and vociferously. They have spoken for the movement and for the women, asking people to not side with the aggressors. There’ve been directors like Vetrimaaran who’ve given interviews, composers like Govind Vasantha who said ‘it doesn’t matter if I don’t work in the Tamil film industry anymore, I’ll stand with her’. So I kind of learned to count my blessings and to focus on this, instead of the overwhelming majority. The minions of DMK literally came after my blood—so much of slut-shaming, asking me what is my rate per night. This is the very thing that I was afraid of (at 19) when there was no Twitter, when there was no social media, there weren’t so many channels, there was no access and you couldn’t even know at the time that you were allowed to speak about issues like sexual harassment. In this one year, if anything, I know this has become drawing-room conversation, people talk about sexual harassment without fear or shame, the concept of safe and unsafe touch. Earlier, a lot of us used to hear from NGOs that they had a very hard time getting a foot in the door to teach children about safe and unsafe touch and now schools have slightly opened up. Even now, schools in Chennai stonewall a lot of NGOs. I tried to open some doors because I help The Red Elephant Foundation organise these workshops for free in school. The number of schools that have stonewalled us saying, ‘Hey, don’t give ideas to children.’ And these aren’t ideas we are giving, we are telling children to be safe and telling them to name body parts as body parts. When you remove shame from naming body parts, your genitalia, speaking about sexual harassment will also be normalised. In the past year, I have definitely had my lows and moments where Tamil journalists — a couple of them — have badgered the hell out of me. Those were the days I wondered and questioned why I’m going through this. Because men like Rangaraj Pandey (CEO, Vendhar TV) are very powerful journalists and the way they take a conversation can shape the public opinion and mindset. He chose not to do that and he chose to side with the aggressor. Those were days I was questioning humanity and whether there is still niceness in people. I’m not saying I’ve not had my lows. There are other journalists saying ‘It’s because of people like you that real people with real issues don’t get justice. I think the next time you speak will be after the next 12 years and we will wait.’ This is the stuff Tamil journalists have said to my face. I’ve seen it all — I’ve seen the best side, I’ve seen the worst side. I’ve had people walk up two types of people — ‘I’m really grateful, you’ve opened my eyes’ and some of who’ve been able to identify abusers in their circle, and others who say “Ram sab accha hai, lekin Ram kisi aur ke ghar paida ho to theek hai”, “I’m glad you did this but I would never let my daughter do this.”

At the time, I try to have conversations with them. I try to understand why they would do this. They think by outing the predator, we’re opening the floodgates for more sexual harassment. And that fear is not unfounded because that is the very fear why women like me didn’t speak up when it happened, because you out a predator and one story of sexual harassment, in the minds of the average man, he thinks, ‘Okay, she is no longer an untouched woman. Since some other man has touched her, I can also touch her.’ They think this woman is now free-for-all.

[After Chinmayi spoke up in October 2018, at least eightother women alleged that Vairamuthu sexually harassed them. He has denied the allegations — Ed] You had said: “If I was treated at least 20 or 30% better, several other women would have come out speaking against Vairamuthu in public.” Has this one year led to making any space for collective action against workplace harassment within the Tamil film industry? Absolutely. The number of singers the singer Karthik has harassed... I mean, the sheer number is daunting. I think, if this (speaking out) had been normal, these girls would have stepped up and said, ‘This happened to us’. And the fact is that the general public had no idea that Karthik did something like this, except for a few stray reports that came through. Even here in Tamil Nadu, people don’t have an idea. He’s been successfully rehabilitated. Other male singers like Mano called me and said ‘Why are you doing this? His career, his life, oh my god. How can you do this to him? He’s struggled so much to get somewhere.’ [Chinmayi had shared anonymous allegations against singer Karthik in October 2018. He issued a statement denying them in February 2019 — Ed] Other film industries in south India, like in Malayalam and Telugu film industries, have been able to create groups, and address and work towards creating workplaces safe for women. Do you think in the past one year, any space for such collective action has been created in the Tamil film industry? No. Nothing of the sort has happened. They have not even come close to setting up an ICC, and I don’t think they will either.

You’ve taken your fight offline as well by holding solidarity meetings to talk about safe workplaces for women. How did you decide to do that and how has it been different from the conversations you have online? It’s not very different from conversations online. There is some organic aspect to it. One of the things that these women working in software companies who came to one these meets said is that ICCs in IT companies set-ups are basically a sham. The second thing they do apparently is — I corroborated with my lawyer — that the HR of every organisation is supposed to file a sort of report either with the labour ministry, labour commissioner or the registrar of companies every quarter, or annually, on the number of sexual harassment cases reported in the organisation. They don’t do it, because apparently, it shows up when you Google the company and will reflect badly on the company. The girl does not get justice. Sometimes, they just give the guy 3 weeks suspension. This is the insight that I have gotten. Solidarity meet is through which I have realised that you are supposed to have in every district, every area an LCC (Local Complaints Committee) which is supposed to be supervised by the district collector. The head of the LCCs are supposed to be there so that women don’t have to go to police station to file these cases. In the country, despite the fact that Visakha judgement came so long ago and LCCs are a part of that, only two states have them. This is the state of affairs in this country after so long. And I also know, this is the story now because it’s one year, is somebody going to write about it in the second-year anniversary of MeToo? Because I’ll get 10 calls this year, next year I’m sure it won’t even be one call. [A PIB press release from July 2018 says 29 states/UTs have formed LCCs, but activists have alleged that many do not function properly — Ed]. Is that why the solidarity meets — to create safe spaces in the real world, apart from having conversations online? Also, because I think these conversations need to continue. Every Sunday, even if 10 people turn up out of which four are new, and then they have conversations — girls and women have just opened up and begun to talk. The other day I went to an event and spoke to a few singers backstage — we were rehearsing and having a casual chat over lunch — and I realised that all of them had a story. The good thing now is that at least we have come to a point where women are able to have this conversation in normal or loud speaking voice instead of hushed tones. And for me, that is a step forward. We have to, unfortunately, be grateful for these baby steps we are taking. At least we are not ashamed of saying we need to shift the blame. That is the one thing I keep harping on, we have to come to a point where we look at sexual harassment as just another crime in this country. As soon as sexual harassment comes up, it’s no longer a crime. It becomes about shame and all of it has to be borne by the survivor. Not only does she need to worry about her own emotional and mental health, and getting over the trauma, but she also has to worry about what happens if she outs this guy, and what happens to his wife, children. Why does the survivor have to bear this burden? This is a conversation I continue to have and will repeat till I die.