Disney to pull out of lawsuit alleging discriminatory pay to females

Walt Disney Company plans to pull itself out of a lawsuit that claimed gender discrimination in salaries, according to international media reports. The legal action had been filed by a firm called Andrus Anderson LLP which alleges that the bias in pay by Disney is causing an unfair impact on its female workers. The company in its lawsuit is representing 10 women workers from Disney who said that they are getting a lesser salary as compared to the male employees who work on the same position. Disney, known for its women-centric films such as 'Moana' and 'Snow White', has denied any such allegations on October 18. 

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Arguments by both sides

The Entertainment company argued that the complainant's statements are absolutely baseless and unreliable. The Disney lawyers wrote in a demurrer, "No California court has certified a pay class action under any law that seeks to include such an enormous number of women who work (or worked) in such markedly different jobs, requiring markedly different skills, effort and responsibility, across such markedly different lines of business." 

The statements by Disney were countered by the firm's lawyer who said that Disney's huge scale cannot be considered any defence. She added that there are many companies such as Apple, Uber, and Intel who have committed to annual salary review so that women in their organizations are given a fair treatment. "Disney could fix this if they wanted to," Andrus said. The Los Angeles Judge Daniel J. Buckley will hear all these arguments regarding the matter on December 11. 

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Kaling opens up on alleged sexism

In another incident of gender bias, Mindy Kaling recently spoke about the alleged sexism by Television Academy which organizes the Emmy Awards. She opened up on the sensitive issue at an interview where she spoke about the time when she worked at the NBC hit sitcom The Office. She said, "They made me, not any of the other producers, fill out a whole form and write an essay about all my contributions as a writer and a producer." She added, "I had to get letters from all the other male, white producers saying that I had contributed when my actual record stood for itself". The 40-year-old actor had been nominated for 6 Emmy awards. Five of those were for producing the show and one was for penning it down. Her show won five awards in total and got 38 nominations for various categories. 

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(With inputs from ANI)