Major trouble ahead for these 5 !#MeeToo Campaign - Page 5

Payal Rohatgi should be commended. On March 15, when she accused hit filmmaker Dibakar Banerjee of "attempts to subject her to Bollywood's most infamous piece of furniture - the casting couch, " she re-opened a can of worms. But Payal should also be prepared to pay the price for her frank speak, warns a magazine editor.

"In Bollywood you can do, but you shouldn't speak. If you brave the odds and come out in the open with accusations like Payal has, you may just be signing your own 'death warrant', " says the editor.

Mention the words 'casting couch' and the most candid of filmmakers and actors invariably hem and haw. Some get clever, some coy and some caustic. But few are able to tackle the subject head on.

"I know Dibakar personally, " says David Dhawan. "He is not the kind of guy who would ever misbehave. "

Picking up cudgels on behalf of his friend Banerjee, director Anurag Kashyap recently said, "I stand by Dibakar. Among this generation of directors, not a single one will cast anyone just because he gets to have sex with that person. " Kashyap reportedly launched a tirade against Rohatgi for demeaning his friend.

With hypocrisy being the norm in Bollywood, the casting couch (albeit an abstract piece of furniture) has invariably spelt doom for the girls who have attempted to say that they were on it or they resisted it.

When Sahiba, the teenage daughter of '50-60 s actress Ameeta (Goonj Uthi Shehnai, Tumsa Nahi Dekha and Mere Mehboob) accused Rajesh Khanna of attempting to get fresh with her on the sets of Anokha Rishta (1986), the youngster got a lot of sympathy within the trade and media headlines, but managed no roles. She went into oblivion almost immediately after the film. And, imagine, even 25 years after this incident, her name still crops up only when the couch resurfaces.

In the early '90s,
Manisha Koirala's mother Sushma accused Subhash Ghai of attempting to subject her daughter to the couch. Hell broke loose because Ghai was one of the most sought after filmmakers at that point. And though Ghai and his girl (Manisha) settled differences; things were never the same between the Nepali beauty and the Nineties' biggest showman. Through her 21-year tenure in Hindi cinema she didn't get a chance to act under his banner.

One must mention here that Koirala is the sole exception who made it to the top despite having this blemish attached to her right at the start of her career.

Mamta Kulkarni was ostracised after she accused Raj Kumar Santoshi of trying to get fresh with her during the making of China Gate (1998). The spunky actress who was seen in super-hits like Karan Arjun, Sabse Bada Khiladi and Ghatak before this infamous incident, became a Bollywood pariah because she dared to speak. Kulkarni was about 27 at the time she was literally shunted out.

When asked about this incident on an earlier occasion, director Mahesh Bhatt had said, "It is usually the ones who don't get the roles, who make the accusations. " Echoing the same sentiment today, trade analyst Amod Mehra says, "Lust is not the only idiom that rules Bollywood. Even if this so-called business of trading favours for a role does exist, both parties are usually game for it. Occasionally, one of them cries foul because he/she doesn't land the role. "

And when the girl cries foul, she usually loses the race altogether.

Take the case of Pretti Jain who dragged Madhur Bhandarkar to court in July 2004 on charges of reportedly having sex with her for five full years (1999 to 2004) with an alleged promise to cast her as a leading lady in one of his films. It is now seven years since that infamous incident and Pretti has no consequential films to speak of, while Madhur has moved on to three National Awards and a rocking career.

Veejay Sophie Chaudhary has openly said, "I couldn't make it to the heights that I could have because I refused to compromise. " And, recently, actress Mink said she received an indecent proposition while shooting for a sari advertisement. Mink also added that her career had nose-dived because she refused to "give in". Or maybe just because she dared to speak.