A popular Indian comic superhero who usually fights rapists and traffickers deploys her powers against a new enemy — COVID-19 — in the latest digital book and film released on Wednesday.
Priya, a rape survivor who flies around on a tigress, has since 2014 been spreading the message of gender equality by helping other women and girls get justice in the Priya’s Shakti (Priya’s Strength) comics.
In Priya’s Mask, India’s first female superhero befriends a little girl, Meena, to show her the sacrifices made by health workers, like her mother, and to spread compassion and battle COVID-19 myths, such as young people not being at risk.
“There was a lot of misinformation being disseminated, mostly on WhatsApp and social media, within India about the pandemic,” series creator Ram Devineni said.
“There was victim blaming, blaming poor people, blaming various nationalities for the virus... Priya challenges that disinformation,” he said.
The South Asian nation has the world’s second-highest number of COVID-19 infections, behind only the US, with about 9.5 million cases and more than 138,000 deaths, according to a tally by the Johns Hopkins University.
In Priya’s Mask, the superhero teams up with Jiya, star of Pakistan’s Burka Avenger cartoon, to help the villain when he catches COVID-19, underlining the “need for compassion and humanity in such times,” script writer Shubhra Prakash said.
The creators said they drew on their own isolation, fear and anxiety during the COVID-19 pandemic while developing the story.
Devineni’s elderly father, a pediatrician for nearly 50 years, had to shut his practice to shield himself and attend, via video, the funerals of two close friends who died from COVID-19.
Monika Samtani, one of the producers based in Washington, said she was constantly worried for her husband, a doctor, and her family, and that Priya’s “real superpowers” were to explore these feelings with honesty and courage.
“She’s a freaking badass. She’s female, she’s brown. And brown to me is really important because I live in the United States and that representation is also what drew me to this because it’s about time,” she said.
“It’s here now, and it’s here to stay,” she added.
Initial talks are underway about Priya’s next adventures, which the creators said could tackle everything from mental health and body image issues to climate change.
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people. The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
Japan unveiled a plan on Thursday to evacuate around 120,000 residents and tourists from its southern islets near Taiwan within six days in the event of an “emergency”. The plan was put together as “the security situation surrounding our nation grows severe” and with an “emergency” in mind, the government’s crisis management office said. Exactly what that emergency might be was left unspecified in the plan but it envisages the evacuation of around 120,000 people in five Japanese islets close to Taiwan. China claims Taiwan as part of its territory and has stepped up military pressure in recent years, including
UNREST: The authorities in Turkey arrested 13 Turkish journalists in five days, deported a BBC correspondent and on Thursday arrested a reporter from Sweden Waving flags and chanting slogans, many hundreds of thousands of anti-government demonstrators on Saturday rallied in Istanbul, Turkey, in defence of democracy after the arrest of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu which sparked Turkey’s worst street unrest in more than a decade. Under a cloudless blue sky, vast crowds gathered in Maltepe on the Asian side of Turkey’s biggest city on the eve of the Eid al-Fitr celebration which started yesterday, marking the end of Ramadan. Ozgur Ozel, chairman of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), which organized the rally, said there were 2.2 million people in the crowd, but
RSS