Inspiring stories of Bollywood actresses who stood up for themselves

Deepika Padukone

Deepika Padukone has been a kind of woman who has stood for the wrong in the society and has spoken openly about herself keeping her stardom aside. She has been in the news for a while when a leading daily national newspaper posted a sexist photograph of her’s along with a titillating title,“ OMG: Deepika Padukone’s cleavage show.” Which left Deepika raging and her comeback to the post was amazing - “Supposedly India’s ‘LEADING’ newspaper and this is ‘NEWS’!!??” stirring up a controversy. “YES!I am a Woman. I have breasts AND a cleavage! You got a problem!!??” she further asked, adding, “Don’t talk about Woman’s Empowerment when YOU don’t know how to RESPECT Women!” not only this she even received support from Twitter users and also from other Bollywood celebrities like Priyanka Chopra, Kangana Ranaut, Farhan Akhtar, Homi Adajania, Shah Rukh Khan to name a few they all jumped in to support her. Take A Look At: Deepika Padukone’s journey from sportswomen to Bollywood star

Kalki Koechlin

Kalki Koechlin has always supported feminism and child abuse, she has spoken about the fact that gender equality is necessary at several occasions. The actress at one such event opened up about her childhood incident at the age of 9 when she was sexually abused by a man and couldn't open about it to her parents or anyone and had to live with the trauma for a long time. By opening up to such an incident about herself, the actress does not want anyone to feel bad for her but to stand up against child abuse and make their kids of aware of the certainty. Take A Look At: Lesser known facts about Kalki Koechlin

Nandita Das

Nandita Das has acted in over 40 feature films in 10 Indian languages, her debut feature, Firaaq, won accolades in India and abroad and she is currently a Yale World Fellow. When she started her acting career she realized that due to her dark complexion she was expected to play lower caste roles or asked to “lighten her skin slightly” so that she could play an upper-class role. Since then the dusky beauty has taken a stance against the craze and given her support to the 'Dark is Beautiful' campaign which challenges the belief that success and beauty are determined by skin colour. Take A Look At: Director resorts to crowdfunding for Nandita Das-starrer

Sonakshi Sinha

Sonakshi Sinha has been a victim of body shaming several times and has been a target of jokes related to weight gain. The Khamosh girl does not take anything lying down, she is known to retaliate with a vengeance that shuts her critics once for all. The Diva is very outspoken on matters that touch her heart. Sonakshi is comfortable with her body so does not deter in challenging her critics, her attitude is 'My Way Or The Highway' for all those who have been going on and on about her weight. Take A Look At: Revealed – How did Sonakshi Sinha became Fat to Fab

Sonam Kapoor

The Fashionista loves to take a stand on certain social issues which defy the norms of society. The recent Meat Ban had her tweeting her ire on the leaders of the nation. Her tweet about the "intolerant" and "misogynistic" view of our country's leaders, on the recent four-day meat ban in Maharashtra on account of the Jain festival of Paryushan landed her in the middle of a controversy whereby she was trolled on twitter for her comment and tagged a bimbo. The actress decided to defend her stance before the onslaught. Take A Look At: 7 Biggest Mistakes of Sonam Kapoor’s Career

Vidya Balan

Vidya Balan has always been a cute chubby actress of Bollywood and she made herself look sexy in the movie 'Dirty Picture' wherein she had to put on 12 kg to fit the role. She not only made it easy to look hot and beautiful for almost everyone who thinks if you're on a bit heavier side you cannot look hot. The actress has been much criticized for her weight issues and have always been a victim of body shaming. As per the stereotypes of Bollywood a non-spoken rule is only a fit, fab, slim model/person can be an actress but Vidya took a chance and stood up for herself and stated that she is very much comfortable with her weight and her body is sacred for her and she respects herself way too much and would not bow down to such expectations by the industry. She also mentioned that gaining weight is a natural process and hampering it can have medical issues. She also believes in staying fit with proper workout and diet plan but not to stress about the weight loss process. Take A Look At: Lesser known facts about Vidya Balan

Priyanka Chopra

Priyanka Chopra faced racism during a young age when she was schooling in America. The actress says that the international world has a lot of stereotypes attached to Indian people and she witnessed a lot of racisms and got bullied a lot and was called 'Brownie'. PeeCee revealed some people even told her 'Go back to where you came from' all this was when the actress was only 16 years old and couldn't do anything about the matter. Now the reigning Queen of Bollywood has taken up an American TV series, Quantico in which she will be seen as Alex Parrish. The Barfi actress had before signing up the project made sure that she would only work if they cast her in an ethnically ambiguous part. She cleared the fact that though I am an Indian, it should have nothing to do with the story, cast me an actor. That's how she tried to change the stereotype of being Indian in the International world. Take A Look At: 7 things Priyanka Chopra has done right to achieve Super Stardom