Arjun in Me Too sexual misconduct row!

Saturday, October 20, 2018 - 15:15

'Action King' Arjun, who delivered major BO hits like 'Gentleman' and 'Oke Okkadu' in the 90s, is in the 'Me Too' dock. Tamil actress Sruthi Hariharan has detailed about how she was "sexually harassed" by the actor during the making of his 150th movie 'Kurukshetram'. It happened publicly, on the sets of the movie, where Arjun touched her inappropriately.

"I played his wife in the film and that day we were to do a romantic scene where we had to hug each other after a brief dialogue. During the rehearsal, we delivered our lines and Mr. Arjun hugged me. With no forewarning or permission, he runs his hands intimately up and down my back. He pulls me closer with my body taut against his and asks the director if we could use this idea of foreplay in the scene. I was aghast," Shruti says in a statement that was shared on Twitter.

"I am all for depicting realism in cinema, but this felt absolutely wrong. His intent seemed anything but professional. I hated that he did it and angry that I didn't know what to say then. Scenes are rehearsed before we roll camera and begin shooting. It helps understand staging, body language, actor dynamics etc. That's the ideal process. You talk, enact, and finally find the balance in a given scene," she writes.

Shruti felt sad that Arjun touched her inappropriately without her consent. On the pretext of doing a romantic posture in the movie, he did this. Similar allegations were made by Tanushree Dutta on Nana Patekar, who too is believed to her groped the actress during a song shoot.

"I made sure I let the direction department know that I was not interested to be a part of rehearsals and will come directly for takes. I also shared the incident with my make up team right after. The incident happened in front of at least 50 people on a shooting set- it happened at my workplace. I wanted nothing but to stay away from him rather than be tolerant and put up with his lewd and completely unprofessional behavior," Shruti reveals.

Not just this, there is worse.

"I didn't want to go back, but as a professional, I had to finish what I had signed for. I continued shooting. During the course of production, every smutty innuendo he made, created an unpalatable work environment for me. His salacious invitations to meet him after work appalled me," Shruti pens down.

Arjun is yet to respond on this. However, the film's director and producer Arun Vaidyanathan puts out his statement on the row and explains what had happened. Arjun is known for many hits in Telugu as well from the days of "Mannemlo Monagadu".