A meeting of Malayalam film industry bodies convened by the Culture department here on Wednesday to discuss the implementation of the Justice Hema Commission report to address issues of sexual harassment and gender inequality in the industry was inconclusive as the Women in Cinema Collective (WCC) found it disappointing, while the Association of Malayalam Movie Artistes (AMMA) called it fruitful.
Although the department had presented a summary of recommendations of around 40 points, culled out from the report stretching to thousands of pages, the WCC insisted on seeing the basis on which these findings were made. The fact that a majority of those who participated in the meeting had not seen the actual report further compounded the problems. But, government sources are viewing the meeting as an ice-breaker between the WCC and AMMA, and the starting point for various steps to make the industry more women-friendly.
"We are a little disappointed to see these recommendations, which are loosely defined. We don't know if the State has taken enough time and consideration to put this together. We want to understand who will be doing it and how. The Hema panel report should be published. We got together and discussed it but it is disappointing, because it is more inconclusive than before," said actor Padmapriya, who represented the WCC.
