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Gwalior: Walls whitewashed after female yoga murals defaced in Indian city
The brightly coloured murals in Gwalior in Madhya Pradesh state were part of a project to beautify the city.
A recent viral video of defaced artwork on a public wall in the central Indian city of Gwalior has led to outrage on social media and among activists. The video, shared by a school student on Instagram last week, showed scratches and marks made around where the genitals would be on female silhouettes doing yoga. In her post, the teenager said she passed the murals daily and seeing the black silhouettes defaced with white markings filled her "with anger and disgust". "This is not harmless damage. This is cheap thinking, dirty mentality, and deep disrespect. It's shameful, embarrassing, and extremely disappointing that even a woman's painting isn't safe from such sick minds," she wrote.
The video of the defaced artwork sparked anger on social media, with many saying that the sight made them "uneasy" and that "women are not safe even in graffiti". The act of vandalism also made headlines, with the media describing it as "shameful", "embarrassing", "sick" and "an attack on women's dignity". This week, city authorities stepped in and whitewashed the wall, but activists say that will not solve the actual problem - the mindset that led to sexualisation of even female silhouettes.
