Priyanka Chopra Jonas opens up about pay disparity in Bollywood

Global icon, Priyanka Chopra Jonas has re-opened the lid on the pay disparity in Bollywood debate.

The actress, who made her Bollywood debut in 2001 with ‘Andaaz’, will soon be seen in the upcoming digital series ‘Citadel’. She said that for the first time her salary matches with that of her male counterparts. She told the BBC, “I’ve never had pay parity in Bollywood. I would get paid about 10 percent of the salary of my male co-actor.”

She added, “[The pay gap] is large, substantially large. And so many women still deal with that. I’m sure I will too if I worked with a male co-actor now in Bollywood. My generation of female actors have definitely asked [for equal pay]. We’ve asked, but we’ve not got it.”

She further spoke about the gender gap between male and female stars on set, “I thought it was absolutely OK to sit for hours and hours on set, while my male co-actor just took his own time, and decided whenever he wanted to show up on set is when we would shoot.”