Tanushree Dutta named her alleged harasser after speaking about the sexual harassment cases in Bollywood. In an interview with Zoom TV, the actor spoke about the incident which happened in 2008 on the sets of the film Horn ‘Ok’ Pleassss. She accused Nana Patekar of wanting to touch her inappropriately and of insisting on shooting an intimate song sequence in the film, even though it was off her contract.
After speaking about how the #MeToo moment struck Bollywood several years ago, Tanushree Dutta in an interview with Zoom TV, gave a detailed account of the incident.
I want to take names – actor Nana Patekar, producer Sami Siddiqui, director Rakesh Sarang and choreographer Ganesh Acharya. When Nana Patekar misbehaved with me, he said out loud that he would do an intimate step with me as well in the song, which wasn’t mentioned in my contract. It was supposed to be a solo sequence of mine. I would feel very uncomfortable when he would come next to me and try to put his arm around me. He’d grab me and push me around and say, ‘You stand here, you stand there’. Whereas, he shouldn’t have been on the set. And he told the choreographer to stand aside and said, ‘I’ll teach her how to dance’. I didn’t know how to deal with this. This had never happened with me before in Bollywood.
Tanushree Dutta
She also expressed that no one did anything when she approached the Director and the Producer.
When I had complained about the same to the producer director, and told them to ask him (Nana Patekar) to stay away from me, they didn’t pay heed. Just because I was new to the film industry, whether or not it was required, let’s do an intimate scene with her.
Tanushree Dutta
Tanushree said she also had to deal with people who were shaming her for speaking out in 2008. Besides, being subjected to political intimidation.
“Post the incident on the sets of Horn ‘OK’ Pleassss, Nana Patekar called up this political party who has a reputation of vandalism and causing damages on the sets. And the producers called up the media to gain publicity from the whole situation. On one side we had the media and on the other side we had the political party workers. They vandalised my car completely. So, I got off my vanity van and headed towards our vehicle. They had my car vandalised, which is also first degree assault by a mob,” said Tanushree in the interview.
“And when this incident was happening, someone went and told the producers that people are vandalising my car. Instead of stopping them or helping us, the producers had the guards shut the gate so we wouldn’t be able to leave the premises. The gate was opened only when the police intervened. If the police had come even 5 minutes late, I shudder to think what could’ve happened to me or my parents who were accompanying me in the car,” she elaborated.
This is the culture of our country. The people who should be ashamed are not ashamed of their actions. Instead, people tried to thwart my freedom of speech when I spoke up against him.
Tanushree Dutta
Here is the interview
Our Opinion
Allegations of sexual assault on Directors, Producers, Casting Directors, etc. are not new in the Bollywood. This is a harsh and dirty reality of the Tinsel Town. The allegation on Nana Patekar is new and shocking. His down-to-earth and a ‘son of a farmer’ image doesn’t make us to believe it.
Although these are mere allegations which are yet to be proven, but there must be something fishy must have happened, that’s why she gathered courage to speak on the National Television. Only time would tell if these are true or she did just a publicity stunt to revive her career.
