Priyanka Chopra-Jonas, a global celebrity, has been open about the pay inequality she has experienced in Bollywood. Priyanka was one of the four Indians included in this year’s BBC 100 Women list. In an interview with the magazine, the actress admitted that female performers in Bollywood were never paid equally to male stars.
‘In Bollywood, pay equality never existed for me. I would be paid around 10% of what my male co-star was paid. The pay disparity is large, disproportionately sizable. And a great deal of women still experience that. If I worked with a male co-actor in Bollywood today, I’m sure I would as well. Female actors from my generation have undoubtedly asked for equal pay. We’ve inquired but haven’t received anything,’ she fessed up.
Priyanka recounted that she had to wait on the sets for her male co-actor to come in the beginning and that she had assumed that was typical at the time.
‘My male co-actor basically took his own time and decided whenever he wanted to show up on set and it is when we would film,’ she said. ‘I believed it was completely OK to sit for hours and hours on set,’ she added.
The actress described how the film business dubbed her a ‘black cat’ or ‘dusky’ and body shamed her because of her skin tone.
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