Bollywood actress Fatima Sana Shaikh, who rose to fame in the blockbuster film Dangal, has opened up in an interview with an entertainment portal about the struggles she faced in her professional as well as personal life. The actress also talked about the trauma of being molested at the age of 3.

"I was molested when I was just three years old. There is a stigma around the whole sexual abuse issue, which is why women and even don't open up about being exploited in life. But I hope, today the world changes. There is more awareness and education about it. Earlier, they used to ask you not to speak about it. People will think about it differently," Fatima reportedly said, as quoted by the entertainment portal. The actress apparently continued to face harassment in the cine industry as well. Speaking about her casting couch experiences, Fatima mentioned, "Of course, I have faced the casting couch. I have been in situations where I have been told that the only way I get the job is by having sex. There are several times people have taken away work from me. There have also been times where I knew I was doing a film and I was replaced because of someone's reference."

Fatima Sana Shaikh added that she was used to people telling her that she did not look like Aishwarya Rai or Deepika Padukone and hence did not have much prospects of becoming an actress. "I was told many times that 'you would never be a heroine.' You don't look like Deepika, you don't look like Aishwarya. How will you be a heroine?' So there are people like them who will demotivate you. But now when I look back, I think, 'fair enough.' That's the standard of beauty they subscribe to. That one should look exactly like this or that to become a heroine. And I clearly don't fall in that bracket, I fall into a different bracket. But there are opportunities now, there are films being made for people like me, who don't look like supermodels, who look normal, average," she said.