Veteran actor Vijay Raaz was shooting for director Amit Masurkar’s Sherni in Gondia, Madhya Pradesh when the incident happened.Allegedly Raaz, who has given a slew of brilliant performances in his illustrious career, misbehaved with a female member of the unit.
Significantly no one from the film’s unit is willing to speak about the incident on record. I tried getting in touch with producer Vikram Malhotra and director Amit Masurkar. Both were evasive. In fact Malhotra wasn’t even willing to divulge the director’s name.
This is just the kind of protective cordon that grows around perpetrators of sexual misconduct in the film industry.One has seen this behavior earlier .But it would be interesting to see where this Vijay Raaz narrative goes from here for Vidya Balan who plays the hero in Sherni. She has in the past spoken out strongly against sexual harassment at the workplace and also categorically stated she would never again work with director Sajid Khan with whom she had done Hey Baby early in her career . Khan was hit by multiple charges of sexual misconduct in 2018 after which Vidya publicly distanced herself from Khan.
With Vijay Raaz being called out for sexual misconduct would Vidya immediately opt out of the film, as it is morally correct for her to do so? There is no word from her as yet. At the moment the shooting of Sherni has been stopped in Gondia.And everyone is tightlipped.
“We’ve been told not to say anything,” frightened technician from the Sherni crew told me.