ME TOO

For last few months even in India # MeToo movement is gaining momentum. This movement actually started in USA, and mainly in Hollywood where  women came out openly about sexual harassment at work places, being sexually exploited at work or even when they were sexually abused when they were young.

Few days back actress (now retired) Tanushree Dutta made an accusation against actor Nana Patekar that his behaviour while shooting was inappropriate which indirectly was leading to sexual harassment.  This happened about 10 years back. She said that she lodged a complaint with Cine Actor Association at that time but no action was taken by them. This news created a storm in Bollywood and most of the celebrities of  Bollywood started speaking for and against the actress. In the end she lodged a police complaint against the actor.

While several women are coming out with their stories on social media, a leading Bollywood production house was dissolved following allegation of sexual assault against one of its four partners. On Oct 6, a former crew member of Phantom Films,(founded by filmmakers Anurag Kashyap, Vikrmaditya Motwane, Vikas Bahl and Madhu Mantena) accused Vikas Bahl of molesting her in May 2015. Bahl is best known for directing 2014 blockbuster film Queen. She said that after a party in Goa, he barged into her hotel room and forced himself on her.When she resisted he dropped his pants and masturbated there only in front of her.Over the next few months he made several advances at her, until she quit in Jan 2017.

Kangana Ranaut, who has earlier worked with Bahl in Queen said that I believe in this girl and  further added that even she could sense something was wrong with Bahl, as even during shooting days he partied all night and shamed me for sleeping early, and not being cooperative and cool. Kangana said that the sexual exploitation is rampant in film industry. She is among the few who came out openly in support of Tanushree Dutta.

As per Anurag Kashyap, who knew about this incident 3 years back, said we , the partners of Phantom were ill advised . We first suspended him, we barred him from entering premises , took away his signing authority. He further adds that I named and shamed him privately. As our Industry is not equipped with handling sexual exploitation cases, it is becoming difficult to handle these types of complaints, because we are creative people and when this type of incident takes place, we have to seek legal advice. In the end with no alternative left, we dissolved Phantom Films.

Now, even the news media industry, in particular, is reeling under the weather, as many female journalists have come out on social media with stories of harassment, at the hands of male colleagues. The wave was started by Mahima Kukreja on Oct 4,  accused one of her colleague Utsav Charraborty for sending pornography pictures. Next day, for instance, Anoo Bhuyan, a reporter of news website The Wire, accused a fellow reporter of Business Standard, Mayank Jain of making unsolicited sexual advances. Two another female journalists also came out, saying that they also had similar experiences with Mayank. After this journalist Sadhya Menon came out on social media and said that  Resident Editor of Times of India, Hyderabad, KR Sreenivasan, had made an unsolicited sexual advance at her. She also gave details of three other women ,who were harassed by Sreenivasan.

Sandhya Menon said, she reported Sreenivasan’s misconduct to Times of India’s committee against sexual harassment but “the woman who headed it told she knew Sreenivasan for along time and it is unlikely he’d do something like that.”

Ammu Joseph, journalist and Co founder of network of women in Media, India, an association that provides resources and support systems for women journalists, said ” if one person comes out, it encourages the others, then other feels that it’s better that they also come forward so that the one person is not victimised”.

Even in Hindustan Times , few women journalists, have come out and accused political editor for making sexual advances.

One female journalist has also accused best selling author Chetan Bhagat of making sexual advances at her. Bhagat issued an apology on Facebook.

In the last few days , there are enough stories on the social media about these types of sexual misconducts, and the list is endless.

At this moment women working in Bollywood  and media houses have come out, same thing must be prevailing in other fields/industries. Some time back Congress leader /politician Renuka Chowdhary admitted that the sexual harassment is prevailing in politics also.

Indian Law requires workplaces to have a committee against sexual harassment headed by woman employee. However  most of these woman employee are not trained to handle these types of cases, so their consistency in handling such cases are questionable. We need to make our institutions more accountable. Each organisation needs to look within itself to see how they have dealt with complaints like this and how they plan to deal with them in the future. What happens when the complaint is against the top bosses of the company/directors/owners. Then the question comes who is going to bell the cat.

One more thing,  man in general, have to understand that we are  in 21st century and at this juncture they have to come out from their old age patriarchal mind set, and they should stop thinking woman is inferior to them and they are the masters of woman. Even in our constitution both men and women have been given equal rights.

So, in the end, friends what is your opinion in this matter.

Please do write your views/feed backs in the comments column given at the end of the blog.

Anil Malik

Mumbai, India

8th Oct, 2018.