Neena Gupta Reveals She Didn’t Tell Her Mom About Being Molested As A Kid From Fear Of Being Blamed For It
According to the statistics, 42% of women get sexually abused before they even turn 19 in India. In fact, many girls get molested on a regular basis when they are still in school. But unlike today, where these young girls are coming out and speaking up about such incidents, it was not always the case. Back in the day, a young girl would have to keep her mouth shut about getting molested because the consequences of being vocal about it meant that they would either lose the somewhat little freedom that they had or would be blamed for it happening to them. And this is not just something that my mom has told me, but I’ve also read about this in Neena Gupta’s autobiography, Sach Kahun Toh where she talks about how she never told her mom about being molested as a kid. I can’t even imagine what it must feel like to not have someone to share your worries with as a child.
In her autobiography, Sach Kahun Toh, actress Neena Gupta shared some of her very personal—good and bad—experiences with the readers. She shared anecdotes from her childhood and school days. And in two of those stories, she opened up about why she didn’t tell her mom about being molested by a doctor and a tailor while she was growing up.
In her book, The Last Colour actress shared an incident about the time when she visited an optician. She wrote that her brother was asked by the doctor to sit in the waiting room while she was taken inside to a room for an eye check-up. Neena Gupta further wrote, “The doctor started with examining my eye and then went down to check out other areas that were unconnected with my eye. I was scared stiff while it was happening and felt disgusted all the way home. I sat in a corner in the house and cried my eyes out when nobody was looking. But I didn’t dare tell my mother about this because I was so scared that she would say that it was my fault. That I had probably said or done something to provoke him… This happened to me many times at the doctor’s.”
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Following this incident, the Masaba Masaba actress dictated another incident that took place during her visit to the tailor. Neena wrote that the tailor while taking her measurements got “too handsy.” She also revealed that after this incident she was forced to go back to the tailor more than once. And that was because she as a child thought that she had no choice because if she would deny going to the tailor’s then she would have to tell her mom why and then her mom would blame her for the molestation.
Neena Gupta soon realized that she was not the only one who was molested, there were other girls in her college who had faced the same situations. She wrote that none of those girls also told their parents about being molested because “that would mean that the little freedom we had would be taken away. Or worse—that we would be blamed for bringing it upon ourselves.”
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Reading these anecdotes that hold so much honesty in them is eye-opening. It makes a woman of this day and age realize how much they have been taking for granted and how long they have come. And for a fact, I know that Neena Gupta is not the only one who has kept her mouth shut about being molested as a kid back in the day. And I know this because when I spoke to my mom and some of her friends, they also shared instances of molestation and their reasons for not sharing it with their parents are somewhat similar. Looking back, I’m glad that most young girls in 2021 have understanding and open-minded parents who are willing to report such incidents and stand by their daughters.
