"I have never felt this unsafe before."
A viral video showing a Sensodyne advertisement featuring actor Divya Unny has sparked significant outrage online.
The poster displaying her face was shown being spat upon with paan in the footage.
Many social media users urged the actor to react strongly to the disrespectful incident.
However, Divya chose to look beyond the personal insult in a thoughtful response.
She said the episode reflected the larger disrespect and violence women face in society.
Rather than focusing on herself, she positioned it as a systemic issue affecting all women.
Divya took to Instagram and shared a video revealing important context about the incident.
She explained that many people had been sending her the viral reel without context.
The footage showed a Sensodyne poster featuring her face prominently plastered on a wall.
The wall displayed her image covered entirely in paan spit.
She pointed out that while several male politicians’ posters were also on the wall.
Only the woman’s face on the advertisement had been deliberately targeted by the perpetrators.
Divya noted that many social media users had expressed considerable anger about the incident.
These online observers urged her to publicly react to the disrespectful treatment of her image.
However, Divya offered a nuanced perspective that surprised many:
“Over there, it is not me, Divya Unny, on that poster; it is just a woman’s face. That could be any woman.
“I can’t take it personally that they spat on Divya’s face. I’m not going to do that because it would be a thoughtless reaction.
“Yes, did I feel a little upset or disturbed about it? Absolutely. I felt disturbed about it.
“But if you compare this to what women in this country go through, from little girls to women in their 60s and 70s, this doesn’t even come close.
“It’s not even worth my fingernail compared to the violence and mistreatment they face.
“It’s just a group of men spitting.”
View this post on Instagram
Her perspective shifted focus from her personal experience to broader societal issues affecting women.
She added: “What is happening to women in this country—the way they are being humiliated, assaulted and oppressed—I want to fight against that.
“I want to make films on these issues so that people’s mindsets can change.”
She wants to use her platform to create awareness and drive meaningful social change.
Divya Unny concluded that she would fight the issue in her own distinct way forward:
“Because this is a mindset problem, an upbringing problem, a generational issue.
“Until the men in our country realise that their way of thinking is wrong, and until we raise our boys differently, this issue is not going to be resolved.
“What happened to my poster is not a big deal, but as a woman, I have never felt this unsafe before.
“I am going to try to change that in my own way.”
The viral video sparked important conversations about misogyny, violence and systemic disrespect toward women.
Loading ...