Actor-turned-politician Kamal Haasan hit out at Bollywood choreographer Saroj Khan on the issue of casting couch in the industry.
“It is the right of a woman to refuse to sit, lie down or kick away the couch. And no woman shall talk in favour of it and reduce the rights of my sister and my daughters who are also in the industry,” said Kamal Haasan founder of Makkal Needhi Maiam (MNM). He was responding to a question asked on the sidelines of a mock gram panchayat held on Tuesday at his Alwarpet residence.
He, however, added that the mock gram panchayat was not the appropriate platform to answer the question. “This is not a place to discuss a casting couch. This is a place where we are casting, forging a new Tamil Nadu,” he said adding that he is “duty-bound to answer the tacky question” because he is from the industry.
When asked to comment on Congress leader Renuka Chowdhury’s remark that casting couch exists in Parliament, Haasan said that it is “yet another corruption in politics; we need to do away with it”.
“We use the couch to sleep on, to sleep away from our worries with or without anyone. That’s your will… These kinds of corrupt activities will continue to go on, thanks to politicians and bad people who abound,” he said while urging the reporters to report on the gram panchayat.
Earlier today, Saroj Khan invited a lot of flak for her comments on the prevalence of casting couch in the industry. In a panel discussion on the same topic on a leading English news channel, Saroj Khan happened to say, "This has been going on since the beginning of time. It hasn’t started now. Someone or the other always tries to take advantage of every other girl. The people in the government do it too. Then why are you after the film industry? It provides livelihood at least. It does not rape and leave you. It depends upon the girl and what she wants to do. If you don’t want to fall in wrong hands, you won’t. If you have art (talent), then why would you sell yourself? Don’t take film industry’s name, it is everything for us.”
Soon after her comments, Saroj Khan started getting a lot of flak. The choreographer later apologised for her statement while interacting with another news channel.
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 "Kamal Haasan hits back at Saroj Khan")
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