Shruti Haasan, daughter of Kamal Haasan and Sarika, recently opened up about her parents’ divorce.
The couple, who got married in 1988, parted ways in 2002 and finally divorced in 2004.
In an interview with Pinkvilla, Shruti revealed how the separation of her parents affected her and taught her a very important lesson.
The actress said, “See, I was born in a very beautiful family. Artistic, intelligent parents, and by the grace of God, lots of comforts. But I have seen the other side of it as well. When my parents split up, everything changed.”
She added, “That’s when I realised the value of financial independence, personality dependent independence. Especially being a daughter and seeing that mumma walked out of a marriage, it taught me an important lesson on why it is important for a woman to be independent.”
Further, emphasising the significance of women being independant, the actress added, “We always see how men’s independence is greatly celebrated. I would also like to say that we don’t need to announce, ‘I am an independent feminist’… we don’t need to do it every day, it is a very silent, ‘un-applauded’ battle, truly.”
“A lot of women relate to this one topic that there is no one to applaud for us, we’ll have to do it ourselves, we have to live every day and pay our bills and it’s a normal part of life,” she said,
The actress shared that despite the separation, she cherishes the relationship her parents shared during happier times.
She said, “For me, when they were together and happy, they were the most beautiful couple I have ever seen because they used to work together, go to the sets together, mumma would do her costumes… The whole family was into movies… I was also in the costume department, my sister (Akshara) was in the AD (assistant director) department, she also worked in the art department. So we were all a family of film people.”
Shruti Haasan said that while Kamal and Sarika made the difficult decision to part ways, they were fully committed to their role as parents.
“Individually, they are two very talented people. I am happy they are still my parents. If they are happy separately, then it is good for us also,” she concluded.
