Shraddha Kapoor criticised for cultural appropriation in Dabboo Ratnani calender pic, wife Manisha responds

Actor Shraddha Kapoor has courted controversy by posing in Native American headgear for Dabboo Ratnani’s calendar. She has been called out for cultural appropriation online.

Shraddha Kapoor’s photograph as part of Dabboo Ratnani’s 2019 calendar has been criticised for ‘cultural appropriation’. The picture shows the actor wearing mock Native American headgear. Ratnani’s wife, Manisha, has responded to the controversy.

Shraddha Kapoor poses for a picture during the wedding reception of film producer Mukesh Bhatt's daughter Sakshi Bhatt. (AFP)

She told BollywoodLife, “We were not aware of this. The intention is never to hurt anyone whether it is from India or from abroad. I had no clue of the ‘cultural appropriation’ issue.”

Several people on Instagram left critical comments on Shraddha’s picture, which was also re-shared by the Diet Sabya page. “How many time does this exact same thing have to happen for people to learn tho? If you’re in the industry and you don’t know about all the massive controversies over using Native headdresses as fashion, then sorry, you should find another job,” one person wrote. “I hope you realise this is cultural appropriation,” wrote another. “This is disgusting. You should remove this picture and apologise. Educate yourself and the rest of Bollywood.”

Similar controversies erupted after Sonakshi Sinha and Amrita Arora wore Native American-inspired headgear in photos. Conversely, Coldplay and Beyonce were pulled up for appropriating Indian culture in the Hymn for the Weekend music video, and during the pre-wedding celebrations of Isha Ambani and Anand Piramal.

Ratnani launched the annual calendar, which celebrated its 20th anniversary, at an event recently. Other stars to have shot for the calendar are Shah Rukh Khan, Abhishek Bachchan, Amitabh Bachchan, Tiger Shroff, Sonakshi Sinha, Kartik Aaryan, Vidya Balan, Janhvi Kapoor, Jacqueline Fernandez, Varun Dhawan, Sidharth Malhotra, Sunny Leone, Farhan Akhtar and Kriti Sanon.

Shraddha delivered the biggest hit of her career in 2018, in the form of Stree. She was recently announced has having signed on to Varun Dhawan-starrer, ABCD 3, replacing Katrina Kaif.

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