Important to Eradicate Irrational Taboos: Parineeti Chopra

Mumbai, Jan 14 (IANS) It is important to eradicate irrational taboos regarding periods, actress Parineeti Chopra said here on Wednesday.

"I come from a very small town, where there are a lot of irrational taboos that exist. The important thing is to eradicate those irrational taboos," Parineeti said at the launch of Whisper Ultra sanitary pads.

Parineeti was referring to the taboos associated with periods. She said that some of it have a history associated to it and some of which make sense but there are some which don't. This includes being advised against touching the pickle, something which Parineeti's grandmother used to tell her.

She said that there were other such taboos such as not to visit the temple, kitchen, or wash hair among other such practices during periods.

"I would constantly feel that I have not done anything wrong, don't stop me from doing this. We now live in an educated country, in an almost developed one. We have come so far ahead. But in these things we are really lagging behind. Such things cannot happen today, it's 2016, it's crazy that we talk like this."

"Such things perhaps happen only in our countries, I don't think it exists abroad. We need to move ahead from these stupid practices. I feel these taboos are completely unnecessary," she said.

Few months ago, a video of Parineeti's outburst at a male journalist for his ignorance regarding periods had gone viral on social media.

She also said that talking about it and not concealing conversations was important.

"We all want to talk about how we feel in all other departments but we refuse to talk about periods, or come out of our shell and remove these taboos - it's high time we do so," she said.

A few social media campaigns recently have been doing the rounds which promote talking openly about this.