Slim, Taller, Fairest

"I want my photograph taken," I said. "A Portrait."

"I'll have it ready by tomorrow," said the photographer.

"It's been edited?" I asked quietly, looking at my portrait the next day.

"This is how you'd be in fair skin. Very beautiful! " he said, obviously proud of his obvious editing skills.

"I'll take the original. When should I come back for it?"

"But madam, why do you want the original when this is such a beautiful photo of you? Photography can give you what nature cannot. That's our technology. Make use of that"

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Let's pause this story here to read your minds:

"How dare he?"

"Aren't dark skinned people beautiful?"

"Beauty is only skin deep!"

And the like? Let me tell you there is more to it.

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Let's go back to some of my earliest memories...

We would go out together - my father, my mother, my elder brother and I. Almost everyone we meet for the first time, would say in the flow of conversation, "Oh, she took after her dad, didn't she?".

Some background information would be helpful here - My dad is quite dark, my mother is quite fair, my brother leans towards my mother's color and I lean more towards my dad's.

And, now back to our story...

I would be playing with my cousins. Being the only dark one in a family of fair cousins, opened up volumes for conversation. After a possible conversation lull, I would hear subject matter experts tell my mom,

"She's so dark. Have you done anything about it?"

"Try turmeric. It's cooling too. My sister's daughter was so dark, just like her. My sister bathed her in turmeric everyday. Now she is wheatish."

"You haven't made an effort with her. Fruit masks are good. Mash oranges, banana and honey. Apply all over her. Let it dry. After 30 minutes wash it off. She will become less dark, I guarantee you that."

"When you are so fair, it's a shame the boy takes after you and the girl had to take after her father."

"Don't dress her in this color. It makes her look even darker."

"Do something now itself. Try multani mitti, with curd and sandal. Even for fair girls the grooms family ask for a hefty dowry (Dowry being applicable for both arranged and love marriages).

And all this happening in Nagercoil - a town of educated people, in the presence and ear shot of a little girl of 5.

My poor mother would feel guilty for not trying to turn her little ducky into a fair swan. She would then try to work miracles with some wonder paste which I would refuse to apply, and run away from.


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The place of education encouraged this. And the time it was most obvious was during the Annual Day preparation, every year.

Teachers vied with each other to have the fair ones in their dances and programs.  The dark ones to get a role were the teachers own children, teacher's pets (The brainies, and children from socially affluent families). The truly talented but dark skinned girls got a role, possibly as the boy in the dance (the female roles are awarded only for the truly fair, mind you) The other ordinary dark ones, stepped on stage during prize distribution - if they had won a prize.

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I bloomed late, but bloom I did. I became slim and tall, but not fair. They thought they were complimenting me by calling me "Black Beauty".

Fortunately, in spite of all this, I didn't develop a lasting lack of confidence. I must have been thick headed. It's hard otherwise, to escape that bitterness for being born dark. I have never been able to relate to those who told me confidentially how bad we feel to be dark skinned. For, I didn't remember the color of my skin unless when alluded to. It isn't the color of people's skin I noticed when I met someone for the first time.

But at times it did wake in me a sense of guilt for being born dark. Like when a prospective groom's mother asked my mom, if the girl was Wheatish or dark. And then say, "I am sorry. We like your daughter very much. But my son wants a very fair bride." And instead of looking daggers at me for running away from all her fairness treatments, my mother would say that he wasn't the one God intended.

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We are all familiar with:

"My son's marriage is fixed. The girl is slim, tall and fair."

"She is dark, but she is beautiful. He was okay with it, so that's all that mattered."

"She looks like a foreigner. There will be long queue when you start looking for a groom"

How often do we hear this? It's mixed with our blood, this worshipping of the fair skinned.

When my future mother-in-law asked my fair skinned, future husband if he wanted a fair girl, he had said, that skin color didn't matter " And thus I bagged my groom. "No dowry" mindset of the groom was a big plus. There are others like that... And our world continues to go around.

The talk of my skin color stopped the day I got married.

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Only to start again the day my first child was born.

"How is the baby? Like daddy or mommy?"

Well, that's what you get for delivering a child in Nagercoil. But, wait! It seems to be an Indian thing!.

When my daughter was 2, my little 5 year old, fair skinned non-Tamil, Indian neighbor asked me.

"Aunty, why are you all brown, and we are all so fair?"

I didn't have an answer to that. So I said, "What's that? Your mom's calling you."

And she ran back home. Thank God, my daughter was too young to understand!


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My son was born in Dubai. We took him to India when he was 3 months old.

"He is fair," they beamed, as if complimenting me for finally getting it right.

I realized there is no escaping this topic - both the fair and the dark skinned people are equally competent here.

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Another year later, Liana started school. She came home looking very sad one day, and said, "Amma, Mia (name changed, of course) said I am yucky because I am brown."

My heart skipped a beat. That to come out of a 3 year old to another. I tried telling her that the color of the skin didn't matter. That God knew best when he made her that way. That both dark and white chocolate are equally loved.

But the damage was done. Things got worse when she said she didn't like her father because he was fair, and that she likes Tessy (Name changed again) even if she was Brown.

I spoke to her teacher who told the class the story of the multicolor elephant and someother things as well. I hope the children understood about the things in life that count.


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Maybe it's infused into the Indian blood, this love for the fair skin. One can look and act a perfect ogre, and be branded as a beauty just for being blessed with fair skin.

I am not saying that boys should not make that condition. Marriage for many, is a once in a lifetime commitment. And who he wants to marry is his choice. Just like a girl has her say in the matter. 

What I am against is, a whole society, predicting the future of a girl based only on her skin color.

I am against linking fair skin with intelligence, success and goodness.

I am against looking upon dark skin as a flaw, as something lesser which needs to be fixed.

Let us accept children in all their innocence, and women with all their flaws. She doesn't need to be helped up, if she isn't thrown into the water in the first place.  It is her life. Let her be. He knew what He was doing.

How do we fix bigger issues of Gender equality when the girl child is rated on the color of her skin from her earliest moments. When will we realize that irrespective of skin color she will be the apple of her parents eye, the love of her husband, and appear perfect in the eyes of her children?