Jaipur, March 8: Bollywood star Madhuri Dixit believes pay parity in Hindi cinema is still a distant dream as women have to repeatedly prove themselves and demonstrate their ability to draw audiences to theatres.
Dixit, the star of films such as “Tezaab”, “Hum Aapke Hain Koun..!”, “Dil To Pagal Hai”, “Khalnayak” and “Devdas”, on Friday evening participated in session “The Journey of Women in Cinema”, which kickstarted the 2025 IIFA Weekend.
She was joined by Oscar-winning producer Guneet Monga, who came from the US after attending the 2025 Academy Awards.
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“For the women, they have to prove themselves time and again and to say that we are equal and we can draw an audience, but you have to prove it every single time. And yes, there is still a disparity,” Dixit, who most recently featured in “Bhool Bhulaiyaa 3”, said.
“It’s like pushing the envelope every time, a little bit more, it’s like baby steps. We are still a long way away from disparity not happening… We have to kind of work every day towards it,” she added.
Monga said people need to take more chances on women artists.
“There is clearly a pay gap, there is clearly a difference and women have to do it 10 times to be doing it once… It’s very hard, but I just feel like I genuinely want male actors to answer this question.
“I feel like the onus of answering these questions on women is very strange, because we’re the people who are at the receiving (end),” she said.
Giving the example of “Stree 2”, which she said is the highest-earning Hindi film, Monga said more opportunities should be created for women.
“There are full possibilities of creating those moments again. One needs to take more chances and to be able to do that. And there is no shortcut to doing more,” she said.
Dixit said every film she did in her career had very strong female characters.
The actor said “Mrityudand” was one of the films she particularly enjoyed because it featured her in a strong role.
“I was very fortunate to get characters that were very strong, strong women hether it was ‘Beta’, ‘Dil’, ‘Raja’, ‘Dil To Pagal Hai’, or ‘Mrityudand’. I mean, if there was one film that I really enjoyed making, it was ‘Mrityudand’,” she said, adding that the movie pushed the envelope for her as a woman.
Dixit said people used to consider her to be the “baby of commercial films” and that’s why they advised her against doing the film. (PTI)
