Suffered loss of work, insults for speaking out: Chinmayi

Hyderabad: Singer Chinmayi Sripaada, who raised her voice during the #Me Too movement last year and accused Tamil lyricist Vairamuthu of sexual harassment, Friday said she suffered loss of work and also insults on the social media for speaking out.

(At the) “end of the day, I continue to face casteist slurs, hundreds of them on a daily basis on Twitter, on social media…” she said, speaking on ‘Me Too: The way forward’ at the Hyderabad Literary Festival (HLF) here.

She alleged that her problem, additionally, found a social and political angle with her caste identity also coming to the fore.

“…It became a caste problem. It became a political problem,” she said.

Chinmayi said friends and people concerned about her well being had told her that she should be careful about her safety.

“I know…there are so many people who keep telling me you have to be very careful when you walk on the road…” the singer said.

She alleged that patriarchy is steeped in women as well, as some of them are also biased against other women.

“End of the day, for a woman to be taken seriously, to prove that she is chaste, she is the Sati Savitri who can still work, who still has talent and can still survive and still avoid her predator and get her work done…

This is something a lot of people cant grapple with and I include women in that as well. Because, patriarchy is steeped in both women and in men. So this is what I am staring at right now,” she said.

Chinmayi said though there is no problem for her sustenance as she also works in other languages, a lot of her work comes from Tamil.

“But the fact is, what I like doing, what I love doing has been taken away from me which I definitely expected. This is not a risk other girls can take…,” she said.

Chinmayi was among some women who accused Vairamuthu of sexual harassment as part of the #MeToo movement.

She had also claimed to corroborate three accounts of Vairamuthu’s alleged sexual misconduct and had posted them on Twitter without naming the victims.

The singer had said in November 2018 that she was removed from the Tamil Nadu Dubbing Artistes Union and that she may no longer be able to lend her voice to actors in Tamil films.

Chinmayi has dubbed for several leading actresses, including Trisha Krishnan.

Rejecting the charges against him,Vairamuthu had claimed in a short video released on Twitter that he has collected ‘unassailable evidence’ in his defence and was ready to face those accusing him in court.