"You must be thinking I have a speech for women's safety or domestic violence or rape or women's sanitation or equal pay cheque or sexual preferences," Saumya said in a video shared with IANS.
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"But I'm not going to talk about any of these issues. I'm going to talk about 'respect for women' because I feel respect is the root cause of all problems. When we were kids, our parents taught us to be honest, to never give up, to work hard, to respect elders but nobody taught us to respect women."
"And when we grew up as women and moved in the society, we complained about men harassing women on the streets, complained about our boyfriends, husbands, our co-workers, our bosses who were not fair to us."
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Society, she said, "wasn't fair to us. We don't have equal rights. But when we become mothers we never teach our sons to respect women. This Women's Day, let us first learn to respect ourselves, and if/when we become mothers let us make our sons to be the husbands that we want in our lives".
"Let's make our sons to be the man in the society, the man on the street that we want in our lives. Let's all pledge this Women's Day to be that mother to bring up a society that respects women," signed off the "Bhabiji Ghar Par Hain" actress.