Jonita on facing cyberflashing: `Saw d**k pic with my photo in background`

In recent times, online sexual harassment and abuse have become increasingly rampant. Celebrities, too, are frequent targets—especially due to their open social media handles and easy accessibility to strangers. Singer Jonita Gandhi recently shared a disturbing experience she faced on Instagram, where she became a victim of cyberflashing.

Jonita on facing cyberflashing

In a recent interview with Hauterfly, Jonita recalled being cyberflashed on Instagram. She described seeing a person post a picture of male genitals with her photo in the background. The person had tagged her in the post and shared it among their Close Friends.

“Some things are kind of traumatic. On Instagram, you can check your mentions, and I’d see that I’d been added to someone’s Close Friends stories. Then I’m seeing it’s a d**k pic. It has a watermark with their thing and my photo in the background. It’s disgusting. It’s harassment. But I keep ignoring such things,” she recalled.

On facing racism in Canada

In the same chat, Gandhi also opened up about facing racism in Canada during her growing-up years. She said she was mocked and ridiculed for her body hair and recalled being teased—even by Punjabi boys in her class—which led to deep-rooted body image issues.

“I used to get a lot of racist comments about my facial hair while growing up. They used to call me Godzilla, and even the Punjabi boys in my class would make fun of me. Growing up, I was convinced that I was never going to have sex because of the same issues. I couldn’t accept my own body; how can someone else accept it? I still have some of those issues—I still avoid swimming sometimes—but music made it better. I feel like I am the ugly duckling who became the swan.”

Jonita about her latest track 

 She recently released her latest song, ‘Beparwai’. Talking about what went behind the making of the song, Gandhi said, “It was a song that was conceived in a session in Toronto. I think I was in a mood that day where I felt a little cynical, I would say, about the world and how sometimes we get carried away with other people`s opinions of us. And sometimes we feel like we want to rise above that and kind of tell everyone that I want to just be carefree now. So that`s why the chorus, which says, ‘Now I`m just carefree’. I wanted to make sure the song still felt like a Jonita song”.

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