Day 22: PADMAN — Spreading the Word on Menstrual Hygiene through Cinema
Yesterday, several of us visited Jaipur’s famous Raj Mandir cinema, partially to see the building and partially to see the movie PADMAN. Despite the movie being 90% in Hindi, three of us stayed to the end and loved it.
The Menstruation Issue in India
The PADMAN movie states that in India, only 20% of women use sanitary pads when they menstruate. The others use dirty rags, which frequently cause infections, sometimes life threatening ones. In addition, women miss out on significant parts of life during their monthly period. In poor, rural families, the women still need to work, but they are prohibited from bathing or cooking because society fears they will contaminate the water supply or the food. Can you imagine five days without a shower?
In the movie’s more urban context, the women were exiled to an outdoor room off to the side of the house during their periods, and they did nothing at all for those five days. Using sanitary pads would eliminate this issue and let them get back to their lives.
There are two main reasons for the low rates of sanitary pad use. First, menstruation is an extremely taboo topic in many parts of India. Second, foreign manufactured pads are prohibitively expensive to all but upper class citizens, so much so that PADMAN’s wife in the movie orders him to take the package of pads back to the store, because she cannot stomach the expense.
The True Story Behind PADMAN
PADMAN tells the story of Muruganantham, also know as Lakshmi, who becomes obsessed with fixing this problem. With no education and little money, he discovers how pads are manufactured in the US and reverse engineers an affordable production system for India.
His journey is a difficult one. He becomes an outcast in his community, is ostracized by his family, and sees his wife move back to her father’s home before he finally succeeds.
Ultimately, he establishes an international business that improves women’s lives not only by providing affordable pads (only 2 rupees) but also by employing hundreds of women as manufacturing workers and as the sales and distribution team.
The PADMAN movie is yet one more tool in his quest to make India a national where 100% of women use sanitary pads.
