I recently read Aishwaryaa Dhanush Rajnikanth’s book, “Standing on an Applebox: The Story Of A Girl Among The Stars”. She describes herself as an introvert and her sister as an extrovert.
As an introvert myself, I find myself baulking at some of the experiences she has had to undergo.
Here, she relates a particular incident where her dad supported the cause of polio back when she and her sister were young children. During that time, they were kept away from the papparazzi and there was no Internet and pervasive media like today.
Some of Rajini’s admirers came home and seemed excited to see the children. One lady made them sing, dance and perform for the adults, to secretly check if Rajni’s children were suffering from polio, and whether that was the reason he was espousing the cause.
After reading this, I felt rather sick. To what morbid levels do we take our curiosity? Breach all boundaries and erase all lines of decency to reach out and grab for a piece of the star! Even if it is through his innocent children?
She relates another incident when she says she went to write her law exam, but since she was recognised, and flooded with questions from the papparrazi, the introverted Aishwaryaa decided to discontinue her course and is now doing criminology from a university overseas instead.
People pry into celebrities’ lives so much, or rather star kids’ lives so much, that they are unable to lead the lives they choose to.
Let’s not forget that Aishwaryaa has not chosen to appear before the camera as a glamorous actress. She is behind the camera as a director and wields the pen as a writer.
It is noteworthy that the foreword to her book has been penned by Shwetha Bachchan Nanda, whose brother Abhishek Bachchan has been called a loser by all and sundry, just because he hasn’t been able to match his dad’s legendary status.
People don’t seem to care that he is otherwise smart, articulate and intelligent. They tear him apart because he is not his dad or his wife.
Recently, memes about Aishwaryaa Dhanush did the rounds after her poor Bharatanatyam performance at the United Nations.
In my humble opinion, although star kids have a ton of advantages, it’s not fair to tear them apart and create nasty memes about them, for they are people too. And it can lead to a lot of emotional scarring for sensitive individuals to see this kind of a backlash on social media.
Images courtesy Aishwaryaa Rajnikant Dhanush on Twitter.