Is dark not beautiful?Prejudice to anyone on the bases of his color, caste, race is called racism. Whenever this word strikes in our mind it reflects the image of Western countries. It is believed that racism happens only in these countries when Harbhajan – Andrew Symonds controversy happened we made it an issue of our prestige for calling us racist.
India has always stood against it and to justify our point we Indians always give the example of Nation’s father Mahatma Gandhi who fought against this bias throughout his life and feel proud to say that “we are not racist”. But the truth is that we Indians are also racist whether we agree it or not.
Our society is diverse and complex although we have love and respect for each other but on the other hand we all have superiority complex over each other whether it is about caste, religion, language we are racist especially we are unanimous on skin racism. Fair is beautiful-dark is ugly this is our preconceived notion for many years and it still goes on. Strangely our original complexion is dark but still we prefer fair and want to be that. The idea that “your soul should be beautiful, nothing else matters” has been only in books.
Beauty matters especially in today’s materialistic world. And if it matters then why don’t we go by whole personality and face features. Many dark complexion people who have strong face features than fair are decided not beautiful.
The reason for this is that we are obsessed with fair skin. Our own parents tell us to use “besan ka ubtan” while going to any function or at the time of marriage when a guy comes to see you. Look at the advertisements for bride in newspapers wanting “fair and beautiful”.
Surprisingly the notion is not only followed in rural areas bur largely in urban places too. That’s why you see advertisements daily on television of various beauty products from face creams to soaps claiming, to make you fair in just blah blah days. It is totally ridiculous, to get job, success use these products for 14 days and u will get them all.
No qualification or professionalism is required. Their saying “that they are just showing what society believes” is justified but to sell their products what definition is being given is absolutely wrong. It is also irony that in many jobs people are given preferences on their color to make their company’s image presentable to customer.
Bias is there but the question is why it is? Dusky girls are called sensuous but fair girls are liable to take home to meet your mommy. This kind of thinking also prevails in our society and it needs to be changed. The film and fashion industry to some extent has played a huge role in this direction that nowadays dusky complexion is in vogue. People are gradually accepting it. Priyanka Chopra, Rani Mukharjee, Bipasha Basu, Deepika Padukone, Carol Gracious etc. are such names ruling these two industries. Apart from this the television channel star plus is gaining popularity for its show “BIDAAI” which is based exactly on this particular skin bias.
A very good show, depicting very beautifully the mirror of our society and that’s why it has become the no one show on television. It tells a story of two sisters one is fair and the second one is of dark complexion and how the second one faces discrimination and insult in society because of her color.
On the one hand these” fair and lovely” advertisements are influencing our minds while show like Bidaai.
