(This article was first published on 26 January 2022. It has been republished from The Quint's archives after the sexual assault allegations against Malayalam film actor and producer Vijay Babu.)
Malayalam actor Divya Gopinath does not want to talk about the #MeToo complaint she had raised in October 2018, but she does want Justice K Hema Committee report, which had documented the problems faced by women in the Malayalam film industry, to come out. Why?
Regarding the complaint, she got a “closure of sorts,” she said, as the accused rendered a public apology to Gopinath, but the committee, which promised her “justice,” has not yet made its recommendations public. The committee submitted its report in 2019 but it is yet to be released.
In an attempt to bring out the full extent of harassment that fellow women actors have been facing in the Malayalam film industry, Gopinath shared with The Quint some parts of what she had deposed before the committee.
“I have had to relive the traumatic experiences that I had faced. I have had to retell the experiences which other women had faced, to the committee. For what? So that its findings can be suppressed?” Divya Gopinath asked.