In 2008, 'Aashiq Banaya Apne' actress Tanushree Dutta had accused veteran actor Nana Patekar of misbehaving with her during the shoot of a special dance number on the sets of 'Horn OK Please'. The controversy had an adverse affect on Tanushree's filmy career. She treaded the spiritual path and soon relocated to the US. She was last seen on the big screen in 'Apartment' (2010).
She recently returned to India after a sabbatical of 8 years and her fight with the industry still seems to continue. In a recent interview with Zoom, Tanushree named and shamed Nana Patekar for making her uncomfortable to an extent that she had to eventually opt out of the song. She also claimed that the senior actor has always had a history of assaulting women.
Further exposing Bollywood, Tanushree said, "Heroines ki roles ki casting hoti hai wo Actors karte hai, casting director sirf baaki ke side roles ki casting karta hai. Jo top lead ki Actress hoti hai, wo humesha Actor hi cast karta hai (Heroines are cast by the lead actors. Casting directors only cast the side actors. But the top lead actress is cast by the actor only."
Tanushree also called out Akshay Kumar and Rajinikanth for working with Nana Patekar despite his disreputable image. "If big stars like Rajinikanth and Akshay Kumar continue to work with these kind of people, then what hope is there for any movement to happen?," she rued.
Describing the on-set encounter with Nana Patekar, Tanushree told News 18 in another interview, “He was trying all kind of intimidation tactics to rattle me. He was grabbing me by the arms, pushing me around then he would ask the choreographers to move and teach me how to dance, and the next thing I know he wanted to do an intimate sequence with me. It was ridiculous."
“I was literally cornered and I was protesting that I don’t want to do that intimate dance step with him because I was uncomfortable with his proximity on set.”
"Everybody saw what happened, but the memory and the popular perception of it is that 'Tanushree Dutta spoke up against harassment and then she was no more.' The entire industry saw what happened, but there was not one word of condemnation from anybody. Every single person in this country remembers my incident and this was something on national TV for three days, but even today there's a stoic silence on that. So, my question is, 'Who is going to believe these hypocrites?' These are the people who stand up and raise their voice against women empowerment," Tanushree added.
The entire incident took a toll on her career and shook her soul to the core. She soon developed post-traumatic stress disroder, after which even the thought of going on a film set petrified her.
“I got some 30-40 film offers after the controversy, but I was suffering from such major fear that I would not even want to go on a film set. Because when you go through such experience you think everybody is like that. You refuse to believe that I have worked with good people also,” she told News18.
Tanushree feels that the #MeToo movement will never take off in India until her case is acknowledged. “The thing is that our country has become so hypocritical, and people constantly ask why #MeToo movement is not happening in India, it won’t happen unless and until you’ll acknowledge what happened with me in 2008.”
“Till the time I’m given justice no movement can start over here. I will keep bringing up this issue every time I’m here because I want to expose the hypocrisy of Bollywood that on one hand you are speaking about women empowerment, but everybody had a stoic silence on what happened with me and they have maintained it even today. In fact, they are not only maintaining the stoic silence but they are also working with the perpetrators,” she concluded.
