There was no discussion about sex growing up in my family: Kirti Kulhari

Kirti Kulhari, in her latest web series, takes on the role of an urban Indian working woman and a single mother, not afraid to explore her sexuality, and clearly it wasn’t an easy character to say yes to, owing to the environment that she grew up in and her mental conditioning.

Sex as a subject is not a drawing room discussion in India and growing up, and for her Kirti Kulhari, her family was no different. The actor, in her latest web series, takes on the role of an urban Indian working woman and a single mother, not afraid to explore her sexuality, and clearly it wasn’t an easy character to say yes to, owing to the environment that she grew up in and her mental conditioning.

“I come from a family where we never talked about sex. We still don’t. Relationships were looked down upon. While I was given a lot of freedom in terms of what I wanted to do. (For instance) when I chose sports over studies, my father was okay with that. There were obviously things he was not okay with and neither was my mother because of their own conditioning. And I don’t blame them for that,” shares Kirti.

However now, the actor feels that sex and relationships should be subjects that parents and kids should discuss openly. “It marks the sign of a healthy atmosphere to discuss what’s happening in your life, if there is someone in your life or to know what’s going on sexually,” she adds.

But Kirti did have her own apprehensions about the role as she didn’t want it to turn out to be just another show with fluff and sex and with no substance. She reveals that it was her husband, Saahil Sehgal, who brought her out of the misery. “I know what it takes in a country like India to do it. While people are free to judge it, we should not be in a space where we get instant gratification from titillation. So, that’s when my husband came to my rescue and told me that as an actor, I needed to get out of my comfort zone,” she concludes.