Anoushka Shankar, the sitar player and composer daughter of late virtuoso Ravi Shankar, has come out with her own story of sexual abuse. In a campaign for One Billion Rising, a global initiative aimed at increasing awareness of violence against women, Shankar said:
“As a child I suffered sexual and emotional abuse for several years at the hands of a man my parents trusted implicitly. Growing up, like most women I know, I suffered various forms of groping, touching, verbal abuse and other things I didn’t know how to deal with, I didn’t know I could change.”
Shankar was motivated to tell her story for Jyoti Singh Pandey, the Indian woman who died as a result of a gang rape she suffered in New Delhi late last year. “Enough is enough,” Shankar contined. “I am rising, for Jyoti and women like her. I am rising with the amazing women of my country … I am rising for the child in me, who I don’t think will ever forgive and recover from what happened to her.”
