October 2018 has seen many accusations of rape and sexual harassment against many men. Tanushree Dutta accused Nana Patekar of sexual harassment. He sent her legal notice for defamation. Vinta Nanda accused Alok Nath of rape. He sent her legal notice for defamation. Sandhya Mridul and Deepika Amin accused Alok Nath of sexual harassment.
Vikas Bahl sent legal notices to Anurag Kashyap and Vikramaditya Motwane for siding with an accuser of sexual harassment. He called them opportunists.
Simran Suri, Saloni Chopra, Rachel White and Amrita Puri accused Sajid Khan of misbehaviour. Sajid Khan is out of Housefull 4 as director and Nana Patekar is out of Housefull 4 as actor.
Harnidh Kaur accused BCCI CEO Rahul Johri of sexual assault of a female author when he was Executive Vice President and General Manager (South Asia) for Discovery Network Asia Pacific. BCCI Committee of Administrators asked Rahul Johri not to attend ICC meeting in Singapore from 16 to 19 October.
Subhash Ghai has an anonymous accusation of rape against him made public by Mahima Kukreja. He denied the allegation. TV actress Kate Sharma has filed a police complaint against him for molestation.
Vinod Dua had accusation of sexual harassment against him by Nishtha Jain. He denied the allegation. His daughter Mallika Dua said she supports Me Too but stands with her father.
Rajat Kapoor had three anonymous accusations against him posted by Sandhya Menon on Twitter. He apologised. His film Kadakh was dropped from MAMI festival.
Natashja Rathore, Mandakini Gahlot, Ishita Yadav, and Ira Trivedi accused Suhel Seth of sexual harassment of themselves and Anisha Sharma accused him of sexual harassment of a 17-year old girl.
Ira Trivedi accused Chetan Bhagat of sexual harassment. Chetan Bhagat posted a screenshot of e-mail sent by Ira Trivedi and said claim of him sexually harassing was false. The last line of e-mail was “Miss u kiss u.” Chetan Bhagat asked “So who wanted to kiss whom?”
Abhijeet Bhattacharya, Anu Malik, Kailash Kher, Luv Ranjan, and Varun Grover are among those accused of sexual harassment.
Geetanjali Arora had no empathy or sympathy for women who said they suffered sexual harassment many years back. It was a case of doing favours to each other. She does not me too stories. She gave a tight slap to anyone who tried to molest her then and there. Strong women don’t have sob stories.
Anyone can accuse anyone of rape or sexual harassment. Victims of sex crimes should file police complaints. Allegation on Twitter or Facebook should not be a ground for dismissal or resignation.
Mobashar Jawed Akbar was abroad when accusations began against him. He was in Nigeria. He went to Equatorial Guinea and returned to India on 14/10/2018. Women journalists have accused of him of harassment many years back when he was an editor. He denied the allegations, hinted at political conspiracy, and threatened legal action.
Some political parties demanded resignation or sacking of M. J. Akbar as Minister of State for External Affairs. Most were silent. BJP leaders know if M. J. Akbar is asked to quit other ministers can also be accused of sex crimes and they will have to quit. Narendra Modi, Arun Jaitley, Rajnath Singh and others can be targets.
Sometimes there is duplicity and hypocrisy in dealing with accusations. Those who constantly say a woman should be believed no matter what suddenly change their tune when their favourite man is accused. Then they say both sides should be heard.