‘Sharam karle’: Reports of Ranveer romancing 19-year-old raises eyebrows

Back in July, Ranveer Singh took to his social media handles, to officially announce his next big banner project — an Aditya Dhar directorial. Coming fresh off the success of this year’s Article 370 (following the mammoth legacy of 2019 release Uri: The Surgical Strike), Aditya will be directing Ranveer along side an ensemble cast comprising of names like Sanjay Dutt, R Madhavan, Akshaye Khanna and Arjun Rampal.
A post shared by Ranveer Singh (@ranveersingh)
Speaking of leading ladies, there appears to be confirmation of sorts, on one name for sure — something that has sparked quite the debate online. If reports are to be believed, Ranveer will be romancing Sara Arjun, last seen across both the celebrated Ponniyin Selvan films, essaying the role of a younger Nandini (played by Aishwarya Rai Bachchan).
A post shared by Sara Arjun (@thesaraarjun)
While this sounds like a great break for Sara, the news of this potential casting has left a sour taste in the mouths of many. Why you ask? Sara is all of 19-years-old. And while you don’t really need a specific number to figure out the disconcerting age gap between Ranveer and his potential leading lady, hearing it sort of makes it worse. Ranveer is 39-years-old, which makes the age gap between Sara and him a staggering 20 years. The internet of course has thoughts on this, and not nice ones.
Calling out a certain tradition of sorts in cinema, which over the years has managed to build an air of normalcy around such massive on-screen age gaps, one comment read: “I don’t understand Indian film industry’s obsession with making their 50 year old actors grope and touch teenage actresses sleazily. Repulsive.”.
Downright rejecting the film, which is yet to even hit floors, other comments read: “Nope. Not watching. Line has to be drawn somewhere. They cast age appropriate actors for a romantic story or they can take their ‘art’ and shove it”, “Bro no way!! That’s so yuckyyy ewww I’ve seen her as child in Deivathirumagal & even PS now😭😭”, “Eww 39 year old romancing a teenager!?? How did they think this was ok” and “Well lads time to put our morals to the test , let’s see how many people will do the ‘right thing’ and not give this movie any attention whatsoever”.
Other comments expressing outrage over the potential casting read: “Okay , she’s a literal child , I’m gonna throw up now!! And I thought I’d seen everything!!”, “Don’t do such casting man…when will they learn” and “They should stop doing this shit. They should stop. They should stop. It wasn’t ok 20 years ago and it’s still not ok right now”.
What is your take on such massive age gaps when it comes to on-screen pairings?