Dharmesh accused of molesting asst

'Darshan eyed him'

Says a source from the unit, "It happened one night when Dharmesh called Vishal over to his room and made a pass at him. A scared Vishal pushed the door open and ran. Darshan had been eyeing this boy for a long time.

The next day, Dharmesh told Ratanji he wanted the boy to be fired immediately. But Ratanji said that if they sent him back then, he would go back to India and talk about it. So they let Vishal continue for the rest of the shoot, but sent him back 10 days before the schedule ended."

Andar ki baat

Says Jain, "Yes, I have heard about such a problem taking place but it didn't happen in front of me, so I can't comment on it. It's very difficult to say what happened. Andar ki baat bhagwaan jaane, but I am very close to Dharmesh and have worked with him in two films and will also be working with him in the future. I can safely say that somebody like Dharmesh wouldn't do something like that. That boy was acting smart. He's cooking up stories now because he was thrown out."

So what happened? "There was some problem with Vishal and the director. The director had complained that he wasn't doing his duties properly, so we threw Vishal out. I heard that this boy had been misbehaving and throwing attitude. It was at Shropshire that the chief assistant director told me that they didn't want him to continue at the shoot. I told them to let him stay on for some time. Then we sent him back later."

Has he met Vishal? "No, I haven't spoken to the boy. He is from the director's unit and that's for them to sort out. Nobody knows who started the story and what the boy said, but I heard he was spreading these stories to get back at us."

Vishal's dad speaks

We contacted Vishal's father, Vinod Talwar. Was his son propositioned by Darshan in London? Did Darshan fire Vishal when he turned him down? "He hasn't told me anything of this sort… ho sakta hai," said Vinod.

"To my knowledge, nothing like this happened in London. I am close to my son, and I think he would have told me if anything like this had transpired. Chhod do yeh sab. Unnecessarily, main kisike naam pe dhabba lagana nahin chahta."

Dharmesh Darshan was unavailable for comment but older brother Suneel was extremely upset. "Whatever is happening is very disgusting and shameful! People resort to anything these days, but then the young generation is such. I don't know where all this will lead to."