Radhika Apte bursts taboo, shares her first period story

Menstruation is a taboo in our country.  We can blame it on the orthodox beliefs or religion, and people still consider it as impure and dirty. So much so, that during that time of the month, a woman also becomes untouchable.

What people forget is that the process is natural to giving birth to a life. It’s not a choice; it is a very normal process.

The fact that we do not talk about such things openly makes a lot of women suffer. Many women’s don’t have enough money to buy sanitary napkins, and they resort to using pieces of cloth, newspapers, fresh grass and even cow dung to absorb the flow of their monthly menstruation.

Radhika Apte told us about her first period, She said that her first period was very memorable as her mother threw a party, and even got her a lot of gifts.

Menstruation is a social taboo in our country. Blame it on the orthodox beliefs or religion, but people still consider it as impure and dirty. So much so, that during that time of the month, a woman also becomes untouchable.

What people forget is that the process is integral to giving birth to a life. It’s not a choice; it is a natural process.

The fact that we do not talk about such things openly makes a lot of women suffer. Many don’t have access to sanitary napkins, and they resort to using pieces of cloth, newspapers, fresh grass and even cow dung to absorb the flow of their monthly menstruation.

“My parents were doctors and so I was told that this would happen. On the day, my mother threw a party and gifted me a watch. I was crying, but still I got lots of gifts,” she said at the launch event of her forthcoming movie Padman’s first song Aaj Se Teri.

Also starring Akshay Kumar and directed by R. Balki, Padman is a biographical comedy-drama, inspired from the life of Arunachalam Muruganantham, who designed low-cost sanitary napkins.

Filmmaker R Balki shares an anecdote from his childhood about the issue of menstruation hygiene and said:

“When I was very young, my mother used to sit outside in the courtyard. I never understood why she sat there for so long. There used to be a cloth hanging. During that time, she never came into the kitchen. I used to hang a similar cloth next to her. I thought it was something you needed to have, some kind of rule. All of us have seen our mothers, sisters, wives someone around us going through this. It is all about being sensitive.”