PadMan: Akshay Kumar launches Pad Banks in Maharashtra villages

Mumbai: Akshay Kumar is one of few Bollywood stars who understand the importance of addressing relevant social issues through entertainment. After the success of ‘Toilet: Ek Prem Katha', a film that talked about open defecation, Kumar will be back on screen with another socially relevant film 'PadMan'.

'PadMan' is based on 'The Sanitary Man of Sacred Land', a short story from Twinkle Khanna's book, The Legend of Lakshmi Prasad. The film is inspired from the life of Arunachalam Muruganantham, a social activist from Tamil Nadu who invented low-cost sanitary pads.

To create awareness about menstruation and to make sanitary napkins accessible to the women in rural area, Kumar is launching an initiative, Pad Bank for Daughters of Maharashtra, which will provide free sanitary napkins to women in villages of Maharashtra.

The initiative will be launched tomorrow in collaboration with Maharashtra CM Devendra Fadnavis and the state government, in several villages including Latur, Solapur and Jalgaon. The state government has sponsored about 20 sanitary napkin dispensers, which will be installed in dispensaries in these villages.

Talking about this initiative, Akshay said, "CM Sir and I have been discussing this initiative for quite some time. We want Maharashtra to be the first state where every woman has access to sanitary pad. Menstrual hygiene is a necessity, not a luxury."

If the model succeeds in the state, the actor intends to pitch it to central government for other states to adopt.

Directed by R Balki, 'PadMan' is slated to release on 9 February, 2018. The social drama also stars Sonam Kapoor and Radhika Apte in pivotal roles.