Kamal Haasan laughs off vile joke, slammed

Chinmayee Sripaada, a vociferous champion of women, has taken on Kamal Haasan in her latest offensive against men who take women for granted. Sharing a video clip of an episode of the Kamal-hosted Bigg Boss on her social media handle, Chinmayee lashed out at how a vile comment was passed off as a joke by the actor-turned-politician.

“A Tamil channel aired a man proudly proclaiming he used the public bus transport system to molest/grope women to cheers from the audience. And this is a joke. To the audience! To the women clapping! To the molester! Damn,” she wrote.

Chinmayee was referring to a recent episode, where one of its contestants, Saravanan mentioned that he groped women while travelling on buses and trains. This was clearly in poor taste but the anchor of the show — Kamal Haasan — who usually takes a high moral ground during his appearances each week, did little to decry this open vilification of women as soft targets.

“I used to do it when I was in college,” confessed Saravanan and the audience cheered the 90s star with Kamal Haasan laughing it off. The entire video clip has since been doing the rounds on social media and garnering severe backlash.

Meanwhile, a social media follower, Kothai pointed out to Chinmayee that Kamal Hassan had indeed condemned this statement, but the singer wasn’t convinced. Kothai posted, “I think KH condemned it. Maybe it should be louder so everyone would hv realised d seriousness.” (sic)

Not budging from her stance, Chinmayee shot back saying, “Condemnation should have happened in the next second. Not made a joke of.”

Sadly, Bigg Boss is known for its rather controversial content each season. This time too, the Telugu version of Bigg Boss had two women accuse the organisers of “sexual abuse”, yet nothing was done about it. Meanwhile, host Nagarjuna feigned ignorance and said, “If anyone is found guilty, the cops will take action.”

But the show has since started, and the complaint seems to have been conveniently buried.