And so the debate continues, is lighter skin shades more preferable?

Will delve into this subject and try to get some answers

The above is self explanatory that is two tones fairer in seven days, can this be the reason why Indian are so obsessed? maybe partly, for the good looks, and then again because of that obsession, it gives the lighter skin female an advantage.

Quick background on skin color issues in India:

Indian people from North India generally have lighter skin than those from South India because of different climates. The point is that the average Indian person is not as light-skinned as models, celebrities and Bollywood actresses. Many sources claim that the fascination with lighter skin stems from India's caste system. People from the higher classes were lighter and those from the lower classes were darker because they did a lot of manual labor under the sun. So lighter skin was associated with wealth and power.

The same mindset carried on after India had been colonized by Britain. Again, the ruling class was light-skinned. Many say the situation in India is much the same today, even with the British gone and the caste system officially abolished.

INDIAN OBSESSION WITH LIGHTER SKIN:

The opinion about using skin-lightening products is mixed. On one hand, I believe everyone is free to do whatever they want as long as they're not hurting anyone else. I therefore support fairness creams. If they produce good results that make people happy, that's amazing. However, it's sad the opinion that only fair skin is beautiful is so deeply ingrained into the culture. This means skin lightening is often not what Indian people do for themselves. They're pressured into it by society.

Bollywood:

The not so fair in Bollywood and yet they have carved a niche.

BIPASHA BASU

Bollywood:

The not so fair in Bollywood and yet they have carved a niche.

PRIYANKA CHOPRA

Bollywood:

The not so fair in Bollywood and yet they have carved a niche.

KAJOL DEVGAN

Bollywood:

The not so fair in Bollywood and yet they have carved a niche.

DEEPIKA PADUKONE

Bollywood:

The not so fair in Bollywood and yet they have carved a niche.

LARA DUTTA

Bollywood:

The not so fair in Bollywood and yet they have carved a niche.

DIANA HAYDEN

Bollywood:

The not so fair in Bollywood and yet they have carved a niche.

CELINA JAITLEY

INDIAN OBSESSION WITH LIGHTER

SKIN

Beautiful Dusky Skin Actresses and Models

There are several earthy-complexioned or dusky skinned actresses who not only look divinely sexy and beautiful but also take pride of their complexion like Bipasha Basu, Kajol Devagon, Priyanka Chopra, Sameera Reddy, Lara Dutta, Diana Hayden, Raima Sen, Celina Jaitley, Konkona Sen, Tanushree Dutta, Koena Mitra, Freida Pinto, Nandita Das, Chitrangadha Singh and Jiah Khan to name a few. To quote Bollywood Actress Bipasha Basu who was voted sexiest woman of Asia for the year of 2005 and 2007, “In India, dark skinned girls are still subjected to taunts and pity. In the matrimonial columns, people still advertise for a fair bride. I’m dark skinned and very proud of that.” However, Asin and Deepika Padukone who are not naturally fair have no problem endorsing Fairness Products. The super hot and successful models like Nyonika Chatterjee , Mughda Godse, Monikangana Dutta and Laxmi Menon are not fair complexioned. Let us also not forget that many of the actresses mentioned above have even won beauty queen contests. Apart from Bipasha Basu, Priyanka Chopra also has won the title of sexiest woman of Asia in 2006. However, there are a few actresses who have gone for fairness treatments like Rekha, Sridevi and Shilpa Shetty to name a few.

None of the above fall into the category of "not so fair"

Here's what "not so fair" looks like.

NICCCCCCEEEEEEE.

INDIAN OBSESSION WITH LIGHTER SKIN:

No, we don’t have a fixation for fair-skinned celebrities! But we can’t help but admire these actresses who were born with naturally flawless skin owing to their lineage. From the Kapoor girls to those with mixed ancestry, we couldn’t help but notice their peaches and cream complexion. Find out who is the fairest of them all.

A naturally beautiful South Asian women:

Why are so many Asians interested in looking white? To me it's another sign of a lack of pride in ones culture and white-worshiping so prevalent in Asian countries. At least, with South Asians, they're darker skin and bustier bodies make them look much more natural and beautiful than many East Asian women IMO.

Now this is what we will refer as a real darkie, would she stand a chance in Bollywood: Although Dark she is still beautiful

Will this Promo Work? Your guess is as good as mine

I was at a coffee-break recently when one of my workplace colleagues announced

that he was no longer pursuing the girl he had once described as a blueprint of the kind of women that attracted him. Upon some degree of elbowing, he finally blurted that her somewhat dusky skin turned out to be a bit of turn-off. I had personally never believed that he would have been able to get it started with the lady in question since she seemed far more liberal-thinking and artistically-driven than he could ever be. However, it made me wonder about how many Indian men still have a perception rooted in their minds where ‘being fair’ equals ‘being beautiful’.

This is a fact among Asians settled abroad too who seem to feel more insecure about their tanned skin hues as compared to the fair-skinned nationals who surround them. It was once reported that thousands of British Asian women suffer horrible skin injuries, even cancers, due to their continuous experimenting with fairness skin creams. Now, we have our leading superstars like Shahrukh Khan advocating the same to men too!

12 Essential Homemade Beauty Tips

For Fair Skin

Arshi
Sep 23, 2013

Our skin needs time and care for it to regenerate and leave behind the old and tired. Without this, improving our skin condition and color is an absolute impossibility. This is why we need to ensure the below basics to make time for the skin to heal itself.

• Drink a lot of water
• Sleep well
• Exercise
• Follow a good skin care routine. Do not skip the exfoliation on a regular basis! For without this we cannot get rid of dead and dry skin. You needn’t always buy a scrub. Homemade scrubs are just as effective! Use oatmeal for an exfoliator instead of a packaged product. There are many options!
• Remove your makeup before you sleep every night. Yes every night without fail no matter how dead tired you are! With makeup on, our skin cannot repair itself.

Homemade Beauty Tips For Fair Skin:

So how to become fair? Now that you have taken good care of your skin, it’s time to pamper yourself. Lather on these lovely face packs and relax as they work their magic. These are some of the oldest and most popular Home made beauty tips for face that our grandmas have passed on to us!

1. Tea water and honey face pack:

Things you will need:

I cup of tea water (cooled down)
2 spoons of rice flour
½ a spoon of honey

The rice flour acts as a very good scrub and honey moisturizers the skin. 

Method:

• Mix the above ingredients and apply on the skin. Leave it on till the mask dries completely for 20 minutes or more.
• Before cleaning the mask with water, make sure you massage the facial skin in circular motions, this is very important as it removes the dead skin and evens the skin tone.
• Then wash your face with cold water .This gives you a fairer and even skin tone.

2. Oats and lemon face pack:

Things you will need:

1 TBSP of oats; cooked and mashed (helps reduce inflammation and heals skin)
I TBSP of lemon juice (lemon helps lighten skin tone)
If you have sensitive skin, then you can dilute the lemon juice with water.

Method:

• Mix the above ingredients and apply on the face by massaging the skin.
• Let it dry for 20 minutes
• Wash it and pat dry.

Look into more of oatmeal face packs for fair face and glowing skin.

3. Turmeric and lemon face pack:

Things you will need:

Gram flour
Turmeric
Lemon juice
Milk 

Method:

• Mix all the above ingredients and apply evenly on the face.
• Scrub the paste gently on your for 5 minutes and let it dry for 20 minutes.
• Once it’s dry, clean your face.
  

4. Turmeric and tomato face pack:

Things you will need:

• Turmeric 
• Tomato juice

Method:

5. Turmeric Face pack:

An all-time favorite! The results have always been so stunning that this has now become a must ritual for a bride before the wedding day!

Things you will need:

Gram flour (Good exfoliator)
Pinch of turmeric (lightens skin tone)
Milk (moisturizer) 

Method:

• Mix all the above and apply the mask
• Scrub the paste gently on your for 5 minutes and let it dry for 20 minutes.
• Once it’s dry, clean your face.
  

6. Yogurt and dried orange peel:

7. Milk, Lemon Juice and Honey:

Things you will need:

• Milk
• Lemon Juice
• Honey

Method:

• Use 1 tsp each of milk/milk powder, honey and lemon juice and mix together well.

• It should be applied on cleansed skin and left for 15-20 minutes
• After which you can rinse it off.

8. Potato:

Things you will need:

• Potato slice, in pulp or juice form.

Method:

• Use slices or paste of potato as a mask or even just the juice on tanned portions of the skin.
• This can be applied twice to your skin.
• After 15-20 minutes, wash off with plain wa

9. Lemon or orange rind:

Here are some more ayurvedic face packs for fair skin

10. Healthy Diet:

With daily care and treatments nailed, what we need to monitor next are our eating habits. For without the right nutrients, our skin cannot undo the damage that it sustains on a daily basis!
Here we tell you what you should eat. In other words, a healthy diet for your skin!

The right quantities of all the ingredients need to be consumed for the skin to portray health and the fairness to show.

• Eat fruits with Vitamin C for the antioxidants.
• Balance your diet to get the right amount of proteins and unsaturated fats along with vegetables to get the right portions of nutrients for your skin to naturally care for itself.
  
• We Have some excellent resources to help you with your diet:
• Best Fruits for Glowing Skin
• Best Foods for Glowing Skin
• Yoga Poses for Glowing Skin

Sun Protection and Care:

With all this attended to; there is still one thing you need to keep firmly in mind! Do not step out into the sun without protection! Are you wondering why? How can forgetting one lotion cause so much damage? Don’t ever question the effects of the harsh sun rays and the UV radiation that we are exposed to when you step out of your home. That is why you need to use a sunscreen!

• Always apply a sunscreen before stepping out.
• An SPF of at least 30 or more depending on your skin type.
• UV rays darken and damage your skin! So make sure you reapply every four or five hours.

These are of course not fail proof! But what if you have already spent too much time in the sun, you first need to lose the tan and burns. Try these out.

11. Homemade Tan removal:

Tans are inevitable! No matter how much sunscreen we lather on…the brutal sun these days finds a way to harm us! There are several ways to remove tan right at your home. Here is an excellent article to remove tan at home.

But here is one of the most famous tan removal packs ever!

Ubtan

This traditional country treatment includes the use of a mixture of besan, turmeric and yogurt. Turmeric removes the blemishes and dark spots. Yogurt clears the excessive tan. And, besan handles the cleansing of your skin. It suits all the skin types and can be done everyday as it is very gentle. The effects are visible quite immediately but removal of tanning needs a couple of days or weeks depending on the intensity of tan.

12. Homemade sun burn cure:

Sun burns well are but natural once you hit a beach for your vacation but that doesn’t mean you need to go back to work looking toasted.

Here is one solution you will definitely love!

Vinegar

Vinegar has antioxidants which fight free radicals and also keeps bacterial and fungal infections away. More than these reasons however, the pH level of your skin is restored effectively with the use of vinegar. Take a clean spray bottle and fill it with some vinegar. Spray it directly on the affected areas and allow it to dry. Normally vinegar dries within 2 to 3 minutes and you can instantly feel the cooling and relaxing sensation on your skin. You can follow the same procedure once in every 5 hours to prevent the burning sensation and cure your sun burn faster.

Click here to know how to get rid of sun burns.

Try these homemade beauty tips for fairness and get naturally glowing ski

The writer is a HR professional based in London and tweets @Terry_Atif

I recently came across an online movement called ‘Dark is Beautiful’, a campaign that has drawn attention towards the unjust effects of skin colour discrimination in India. The campaign features famous Indian actress Nandita Das, who has urged women to throw out their fairness creams and abandon the belief that dark skin is ugly.

I was quite surprised to find out that Das is, perhaps, the only actress to have resolutely kept her dusky skin tone, despite the demands of the ruthless entertainment industry, where there is an explicit preference for light-skinned actors.

The same stands true about Pakistani society. We are also obsessed with fair skin in female appearance. Like many facets of our society, which is built around hypocrisy, opulent display of wealth and a growing divide between the haves and have-nots, there is also a clear disparity of ‘fair’ and ‘dark’ complexion of women. Racism runs deep in the subcontinent’s history, with its roots intertwined with caste and colonialism.

A majority of women in our society focus on their colour and body image upon reaching puberty. Teenage girls try to fit in by having fairer and flawless skin, and perfect bodies, all the while trying to be ‘cool’ and popular. They worry more about their appearance instead of their academic work. Girls who are not able to keep up with this fashion begin to suffer from low self-esteem and lack of confidence.

For me, it is not just an issue of self-confidence and self-esteem alone. I have personally come across many girls who have experienced adverse side-effects from the continual use of these fairness and bleach creams in order to find the ‘perfect rishta’.

Some of them had gone to great lengths to lighten their skin colour, even resorting to the use of steroids. Most fairness creams contain mercury which can easily penetrate into the skin and reduce the amount of melanin, making the skin more vulnerable to UV rays by thinning it. This may lead to serious problems like skin cancer, muscle weakness, osteoporosis and in case of pregnant women, it can cause damage to the foetus and the nervous system.

However, despite warnings from experts, the demand does not seem to be lessening and the credit for this goes to aggressive advertisement campaigns by the corporate sector. The media and marketers play a huge role in influencing young girls, by getting popular female media personalities to endorse their fairness brands. Most of these advertisement campaigns are designed to ‘hook’ gullible women into believing that happiness, success and romance are connected with having fairer skin.

Hopefully, things will change and get better. It is campaigns like ‘Dark is Beautiful’ which establish steps in the right direction. I believe we should have a similar campaign in Pakistan to stand up against such notions that generate discrimination based on skin colour. It is obvious that we need to take some action and help young girls understand that looks don’t always matter.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 3^rd, 2013.

Sex and skin colour: India confronts its

white-skin obsession

The popular, international television channel, Al Jazeera, has done what no other network ever contemplated doing. It featured a documentary exposing the insane obsession India has with whiter skin, not light hue but white complexion. For those interested in its content, please go to the online edition of Al Jazeera and do the search. It is simply incredible that the world’s best media in every aspect, be it news reporting, documentary, investigative journalism has not touched on this infamy in India.

I am referring to the BBC. The thing is now wide open, thanks to Al Jazeera. The documentary is revealing in that though it was known throughout the world the white skin thing exists in India due to its film industry, what was not know was the extent to which India has become obsessed with this cultural hedonism, philosophical nihilism and colonial sickness. The first attempt at fighting this man-made cancer, according to Al Jazeera, was the formation of Women of Worth (WOW).  Based in the southern city of Chennai, in August it promoted a campaign called “Dark is Beautiful.” Al Jazeera went on to state that though WOW wooed many sections of India when it started in 2009, its “Dark is Beautiful” campaign was boosted to the skies when it interview Bollywood actor (actor not actress, the latter word is gone from the English language), Nandita Das. Not only was Das a supporter of WOW, but Das herself got actively involved in a campaign committee that saw advertisements ringing out with the catchy phrase, “Stay Unfair, Stay Beautiful. In her interview with Al Jazeera, Das intoned, “As the issue impacts so many people, young girls in particular, by default I have become a champion of it.”

Then Das spoke the unspeakable. Yes, this is India, a great country, an enduring democracy and a nation whose judicial independence is second to none. Here is Nandita Das talking about her country, India. “I have had directors and camerapersons telling me that it would be good if I made my skin lighter as I was playing an educated, upper class woman.” Al Jazeera interviewed Kavita Krishnan, Secretary of the All India Progressive Women’s Association. She indicated that it stems from the caste system.

When I read that aspect of the analysis of India’s insane pursuit of white skin, I thought of the famous book by Guyanese academic, Kean Gibson. Gibson’s book on the racist nature of Hinduism based on its inherency of the caste system (the great Mahatma Gandhi is on record as saying that the caste system is an essential Indian value that should be accepted) makes for good reading. The Al Jazeera documentary found that because of the colour bias arising from the caste system, certain professions are exclusively reserved for Indians with lily white skin. They include aviation, films, and white collar occupations. Al Jazeera quoting from the popular newspaper, Indian Express, found that in the state of Maharashtra, a hundred low caste girls were selected for training on a government scholarship programme to be flight attendants (not air hostess, that word like actress is gone from the English language) and cabin crew.

But 92 were refused employment because none was white as snow which is the requirement in the flight industry. Only eight who were brown-skinned were given jobs, but only as ground staff. According to Al Jazeera, the lightening cream industry is one of the fastest growing profit areas in the Indian economy and in 2014 it is set to raise about US$3.6 billion. Indians buy lightening cream the way parents buy chocolate for their kids (I wonder if Indians prefer white chocolate to the normal, phenomenal dark Cadbury’s?) The Bollywood superstar, Shah Rukh Khan has come under the radar of WOW and other campaigners. He is featured in a white skin advertisement in which he tosses a tube of fairness cream to a youth telling him that white complexion is the success to life. WOW has filed court papers against the cream company, Emami, requesting that the ad be pulled and the campaigners intend to ask Khan to distance himself from the depravity.

But if you think the Khan placement was bad, there was a huge outcry in India last year when a cosmetic company launched a fairness product with the words, “lighten your skin around the vagina.” Bollywood filmmaker, Shekhar Kapur joined the outcry when he tweeted against it and according to Al Jazeera, within a day millions had supported the anger of Kapur. But let’s end on a curious note. Why would sex be more enjoyable if around the vicinity of a woman’s vagina, the skin is white? Are orgasms and skin colour related? Over to the Sigmund Freud scholars

Why are these indian men so crazy for fair skin women? Is it because any of the following?

1. They were enslaved for over 250 years by white(fair skin) people. White people taught them that they are inferior and good for nothing.
2. Hollywood/Bollywood
3. Porn industry: Most women in that industry are white people.
4. Indian society is sexually deprived, there is no concept of dating.