'Love Every Body' to redefine beauty, end body shaming

Top 10 Bollywood celebrities who went from fab to fat’; ‘Bollywood actresses who lost weight after being fat shamed’; ‘Indian socialites who need to shape up’. These are the kind of stories that pop up in our tabloids and the Internet, featuring real people, who are at the top of their game, yet ridiculed and shamed for not having a certain body type. Sitcoms and movies so frequently use overweight characters’ bodies as the basis of the show’s humour. Not just that, we’ve all had experiences or witnessed people in our lives being subjected to comments like ‘You are fat, yet you look good’, because, by popular notion, weight and beauty are not mutually exclusive. The so-called ‘compliment’ is a blatant manifestation of the stigma that being overweight amounts to being ugly and that the person in question looks nice despite the ‘flaw’. No matter what we look like, fat or skinny, we’ve all had insecurities about our bodies at some point in our lives. 

However, it was this ridicule and discrimination that Mallika Angela Chaudhuri turned into her strength. “I am basically a Canadian actress. Back there, I never felt limited or discriminated against because of my body. But when I came to India, and auditioned for roles, rather than looking at my talent, the focus was on my appearance. I was rejected several times because my frame did not ‘fit the bill’. I was so discouraged. One fine day, I thought to myself that I’m done working like a dog to impress others. I didn’t want to be a role model, not even to my sister who basically copies everything I do. Because, who decides what’s perfect and what’s not? There could be 10 different women who are all a size 14. That’s when I decided to go ahead with Love Every Body. I started talking about it,” recalls Mallika, who then put up a video in October last year, in which she urged people to celebrate their bodies the way they are. But, spreading the word and giving it a bigger voice required a wider platform. 

This is when media professional Roshni Hemdev who has also been at the receiving end of fat shaming, came into the picture. “Body shaming has become so rampant that even kids as young as 15 are subjected to it. Once, my niece wouldn’t eat ice cream outside because her mother had warned her that she’d become fat, which by her idea equals to being ugly. It leaves an impact which is both physically and mentally unhealthy. So, we wanted to encourage people to rise above the ideals that are created by society. We wanted to tell everyone who has ever looked in the mirror and asked ‘Why can’t I be perfect?’, but what is perfect? Who decides?” adds Roshni. 

The two then decided to team up with celebrity photographer G Venket Ram to shoot a calendar. “It was an eye-opener because being a photographer, I have also been guilty of promoting a certain body type, that does not even represent one per cent of the population, be it for advertising or otherwise,” adds Venket. The calendar, that was launched at Phoenix MarketCity, includes models of all sizes, heights and skin tones including Bollywood actor Abrar Zahoor of Neerja fame and rapper Sofia Ashraf. 

“When we walk into a shopping mall, we see mannequins that give us an impression that only a particular size, look or skin tone is the ideal body. When we realise that we don’t look like it, we develop a certain insecurity. To change this perception, we shot regular and confident people with mannequins that were broken, thereby sending out the message that their size, their age and their colour is perfect and they’re the reality, not the mannequins,” explains Venket. 

As part of the campaign, there will also be a free helpline launched to help those who need assistance to get over body shaming or depression stemming from it. At the end of the day, the message both Roshni and Mallika hope to convey is to “drop the stereotypical ideas of perfection. Tell your body it is beautiful and absolutely, perfectly, imperfect. These are your unique qualities and traits that you deserve to be proud of and celebrate. Be you and relentlessly you.”