If there’s anyone who can be described as the epitome of breaking stereotypes, it would be Sunny Leone. From joining the porn industry to acting in music videos, then moving on to reality TV, and finally and successfully transitioning to an acting career in mainstream Bollywood, Sunny has had quite an interesting life.
Let’s take a quick look at how Sunny has been breaking stereotypes left, right and centre:
Entering the porn industry
Sunny (originally named Karenjit Kaur Vohra) was born in Canada to Punjabi parents. She joined the adult entertainment industry in 2001. She was one of the handful of South Asian performers to enter the industry and make a mark. At the same time, she would also participate in mainstream ventures such as music videos, movies (cameos) and, even award shows as a presenter. In 2013, Sunny announced her retirement from the porn industry for good.
Bigg Boss & Bollywood
In 2011, Sunny entered Indian reality show Bigg Boss as a contestant, and received widespread publicity in India. At the same time, she was approached by Mahesh Bhatt with an offer for the lead role in the film, Jism 2. Sunny accepted the offer and the rest is history.
Sunny has since made 22 appearances in various Indian films, which include Bollywood, Tamil and Kannada films, and has undoubtedly built herself a successful career in the Indian film industry.
Writing career
In April 2016, Sunny launched her first book, in ebook form. It was a collection of love stories titled – Sweet Dreams, and was well received by readers and critics.
Adopting a baby girl
Last month, Sunny and her husband, Daniel Weber pleasantly surprised everyone by adopting a baby girl. The couple adopted the 21 months old Nisha Kaur Weber from Latur in Maharashtra.
Talking to an English daily, Sunny said –
Right now, it’s all so brand new because it has just been a few days. The moment we got the picture (of Nisha); I was so excited, happy, emotional and so many different feelings. We literally had three weeks to finalise everything. Usually, people get nine months to prepare
Being an Overseas Citizen of India (OCI), Sunny had to wait a bit before she and Daniel were given the opportunity to welcome Nisha into their family, as by law, the child is first referred to Indian nationals, and only if the child isn’t adopted for two months, are they referred to overseas applicants.
According to the adoption agency, Central Adoption Resource Authority(CARA), the toddler was rejected by 11 prospective parents before she found loving parents in the form of Sunny and Daniel. Commenting on the adoption, Mr. Deepak Kumar, CEO, CARA said –
Without looking at colour, background and health status, Sunny Leone happily took the child in adoption. We respect that they didn’t try to bend the rules and stood in the queue like all the other parents
About their decision to adopt a child, Daniel Weber had the following comment –
Never in my life did I think that I want to adopt a child. People doing such amazing work at the orphanage changed my mind
Of course self-appointec critics couldn’t hold themselves back from trolling the new parents online. People took to social media to criticise the couple’s decision, to express their concern for the girl’s future, to downright insult the toddler for her looks.
Constant Target of Trolls
Not that Sunny is a stranger to trolling. Since the time she entered the Indian entertainment industry, she has been a constant target of trolls. Self-righteous “concerned netizens” never miss any opportunity to drag Sunny’s past into the discussion, no matter its relevance.
Even news channels haven’t been immune to this tendency to troll and sometimes, overenthusiastic journalists seem to lose all sight of decency to score juicy bites. Just last year, during an interview to promote her film, Mastizaade, Sunny found herself at the receiving end of some very rude & sexist questions from the interviewer. Questions like –
What mistakes and wrong decisions have you taken?
The interviewer branded her as a “porn queen”, and said that the makers of her film, Ek Paheli Leela, had difficulty finding male actors because she was in the film, as well as that Kapil Sharma was very uncomfortable when she was a guest on his show.
Kudos to Sunny for keeping her cool through all this and giving some excellent replies to the interviewer. Even Bollywood stars like Alia Bhatt, Dia Mirza, and Rishi Kapoor came to her defence, and criticised the interviewer for his hyper opinionated line of questioning.
Clearly, a lot of us have much to learn from this serial stereotype breaker, who has made herself a mainstream career against all odds, about grace, resilience, and keeping one’s composure.
The YourDOST team would like to convey its heartiest congratulations to the couple for the new addition to their family and wishes Sunny all the best for her future endeavours.
Related Reading – Anjali Lama, The Transgender Model Is Breaking Stereotypes Against Their Community
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