Eight years ago, Swara Bhaskar had written an open letter to Sanjay Leela Bhansali over the glorification of jauhar and sati in the Deepika Padukone-led film Padmaavat. At a recent event in Delhi, she revisited the open letter and explained what had made her so "mad", stating that the representation of thousands of women committing jauhar to protect their "honour" could make rape survivors look like "cowards" today for choosing to live.
Her latest remark has invited widespread backlash.
Internet Reactions
One user wrote, "Madam #SwaraBhaskar, jauhar was not some impulsive response to a single incident of rape. It was rooted in the fear of capture, enslavement, sexual violence and the loss of dignity after defeat. And please don't presume to speak for rape survivors or decide for them what is 'worse' - rape or death. That is an intensely personal trauma, not a moral calculation you get to make on their behalf."
Madam #SwaraBhaskar,
— She (@UnborrowedPen) September 1, 2026
Jauhar was not some impulsive response to a single incident of rape. It was rooted in the fear of capture, enslavement, sexual violence and the loss of dignity after defeat.
And please don't presume to speak for rape survivors or decide for them what is… https://t.co/kxSgqunCNy
Another person defended the actress, stating, "Don't know why @ReallySwara is getting so much hate here, not just from the usual RW trolls but also from many liberals. People need to understand what she is actually saying. She isn't calling the women who committed jauhar cowards. We can talk about them with empathy and still acknowledge that they were conditioned to believe their honour was more important than their lives, and that was deeply problematic. Swara is criticising the message that scene in the film was conveying. The film glorified and glamourised jauhar, and that's what she and many of us find disturbing."
Don't know why @ReallySwara is getting so much hate here, not just from the usual RW trolls but also from many liberals. People need to understand what she is actually saying. She isn't calling the women who committed Jauhar cowards. We can talk about them with empathy and still… https://t.co/xq3VMz8NbN
— pranav pradhi (@pranavpradhi1) September 1, 2026
Another user commented, "Jauhar was and remains an act of utmost bravery in the face of unimaginable brutality.
Swara is using a false equivalence of rape to compare a medieval barbarity and atrocity. Showing stunning ignorance she says that she is arguing that why shall a pregnant women commit jauhar just to protect her foetus. What a wilful intellectual blindness."
Jauhar was and remains an act of utmost bravery in the face of unimaginable brutality.
— amit kilhor (@amitkilhor) September 1, 2026
Swara is using a false equivalence of rape to compare a medieval barbarity and atrocity.
Showing stunning ignorance she says that she is arguing that why shall a pregnant women commit jauhar… https://t.co/xTv6Ef0lU5
Podcaster Richa Anirudh added, "When intelligence, understanding, and sensitivity diminish... one should speak even less. #SwaraBhaskar"
बुद्धि,समझ,संवेदनशीलता कम हो...
— richa anirudh (@richaanirudh) September 1, 2026
तो बोलना भी कम ही चाहिए 🙏 #SwaraBhaskar
Another reaction read, "Swara Bhaskar calling the act of jauhar a cowardly act. Swara is a coward; those who committed jauhar were the bravest women ever born on the face of this planet. One pinch of our history is enough to destroy the fakery of such 'activists'."
Swara Bhasker calling the act of “Jauhar” a cowardly act. Swara is a coward, those who committed Jauhar were the bravest women ever born on the face of this planet. One pinch of our history is enough to destroy the fakery of such “activists”. https://t.co/ky9dkRi3TF
— Prof. Abhishek Anand (@abhishekanandji) September 1, 2026
What Did Swara Bhaskar Say?
In a video going viral on social media from a recent Delhi event, Swara Bhasker is heard saying, "I'm watching this and it shows all these 800 women committing jauhar which is the story. Watching it I was thinking that 'God forbid, I was a rape survivor, what is this film telling me? I would feel like a coward. That I didn't kill myself to save my 'honour'."
Furthermore she added, "Is that what you want to tell women in a society like ours where I feel like there's any way a rape epidemic. Is that what we want to tell our survivors that you don't deserve to live? That if you had actually been brave and honourable women, you would have killed yourself? Are we saying that rape is the end of a woman's life?"
Swara Bhasker said Padmaavat had many things that were "just so problematic".
"There was like one shot that made me so mad. I was like, 'Chhee!' There is a close-up of a pregnant woman's belly and she's going... So, you're saying that a foetus that might be female doesn't deserve to be born because she might be raped by a Muslim ruler? I was so mad and then I came out and I was like, 'This is terrible'," she recounted.
She said she waited for five days before penning down the open letter that was published on the website The Wire.
"Normally people think I do these things (expressing an opinion) in a rage but I waited for five days. I was like 'Let me check if I still feel like this. At the end of five days I wrote this letter," she added.
In the 2018 letter, Swara Bhasker wrote that she "felt reduced to a vagina" after watching Padmaavat.
She also called out Bhansali for glorifying acts - jauhar and sati. "Women have the right to live despite being raped, sir. Women have the right to live, despite the death of their husbands, male 'protectors', 'owners', 'controllers of their sexuality'... whatever you understand the men to be," she had written in her letter.
About Padmaavat
Padmaavat is based on Malik Muhammad Jayasi's ballad of the same name, which narrates the story of Rani Padmini of Chittor. "Padmaavat" features Deepika Padukone as Padmavati, who performs jauhar along with hundreds of Rajput women, after Alauddin Khilji breeches the fort of Chittor.
Directed by Sanjay Leela Bhansali, the film was led by Ranveer Singh, Deepika Padukone and Shahid Kapoor.
ALSO READ | "Is Rape End Of A Woman's Life?" Swara Bhasker Revisits Padmaavat Open Letter On Jauhar To Bhansali
