Indian Models Face Racial Discrimination in Their Own Country

March 30, 2011

Indian supermodel Carol Gracias
 
After reading The Telegraph I was shocked to learn that India's top models have accused their country's Fashion Industry of racial discrimination.

India's fashion industry is widely growing, hosting events such as Indian Fashion week and producing up and coming designers Manish Arora and J.J. Valaya.

However, Several of the country's top models have spoken out about prejudice and discrimination in the Indian fashion industry.
They say India has an obsession with pale skin that dates back to British colonial rule.

Indian Model and actress Dipannita Sharma


Leading model and actress Dipannita Sharma said believes it will take many years for the prejudice to fade, "It's not just the fashion industry, India per se is obsessed with white skin. We will take another hundred years to completely get over it. The industry doesn't openly agree that preferring foreign models over Indian models just for the skin tone is racism. It has some kind of fairness obsession."

Indian Fashion Week 2011

It has also been reported that even the most successful Indian super models are only paid between £550-£600 per show -a tiny fraction of the cost western models are paid.

Indian supermodel Carol Gracias added "You never see a dark-skinned girl on TV ads and that's where the lucrative work is. Everyone uses fair-skinned girls, people use skin-lighteners like 'Fair and Lovely'. I don't - maybe I would have been fair and lovely by now."

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