Interrogating Stigma: Menstrual Management and Maternal Masculinity in R. Balki’s Padman

What is it about?

Arunachalam Muruganantham, India’s Menstrual Man, who started a sanitary napkin revolution by inventing a low-cost pad-making machine, has been a popular subject of recent dialogues and discourses about menstrual management in contemporary South Asia. In this article I analyze the questions of menstrual management and maternal masculinity in R. Balki’s film Padman (2018), a cinematic representation largely inspired by Muruganantham’s life. I demonstrate how the myths, taboos, and restrictions surrounding menstruation in India are radically deconstructed in the film through its emphasis on interrogating the idea of menstrual stigma and period shaming vis-à-vis popular culture. The epistemological implications of such destigmatizing representations are both profound and far-reaching even as they effectively contribute toward the widespread proliferation of grass-roots activism, menstrual counter-cultures, and third-wave feminist practices.

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