MeToo: Sushant Singh Rajput denies sexual misconduct allegations; says it's a smear campaign

Sushant Singh Rajput has denied sexual misconduct allegations levelled against him in a report which states the actor behaved inappropriately with Kizie Aur Manny co-star Sanjana Sanghi.

In the report, which started doing the rounds on social media Thursday, the actor was accused of harassing his female lead of the film. 

While Sanjana, who will be making her big screen acting debut with the film, has not yet spoken on the matter, Sushant shared his side of the story with screenshots of a conversation between him and Sanjana. 

In the chat, the actors are sharing their experience of working with each other and "non-conducive conditions" on the film's set. 

"I feel sad to reveal personal information but it seems that there is no other way to state what was, in the midst of this curated and well-timed smear campaign. From the first till the last day of the shoot, this is what happened on the set with Sanjana," Sushant tweeted.

According to the report, Sanjana had informed director Mukesh Chabbra about Sushant's alleged behaviour, during the film's shoot in July, but he "laughed off the matter".

After the allegations, many other reports started speculating that Sushant's verification badge appears to have been revoked by Twitter. The actor, however, clarified that his verification has been missing since September 5.  

"And for all those deliberately using the missing of Twitter 'blue tick' to substantiate their false claims, allow me to tell you that it is not there since 5th of September. Get your facts checked before jumping to conclusions that you so eagerly want to," Sushant wrote.

In August, a report in DNA had claimed that the shooting for Kizie Aur Manny was stalled because Sushant made Sanjana "uncomfortable" on the sets. 

Casting director Mukesh Chhabra, who was set to make his directorial debut with the film, supported Sushant saying "no such incident happened on the sets".

"I totally stand by @itsSSR - no such incident happened on the sets and let's not have a Twitter trial and make an innocent person suffer for somebody else's ulterior motives I had clarified this on twitter long back and I still maintain it," he tweeted. 

Chhabra was Friday suspended from his directing duties on "Kizie Aur Manny" over sexual harassment allegations by multiple women.

In a statement, the production house, Fox Star Studios, said till the time Mukesh Chhabra Casting Company concludes its inquiry into the allegations, the director remains suspended. 

"As a responsible organisation, Star India takes any allegation of sexual harassment of women at workplace very seriously, hence, Fox Star Studios has suspended the services of Mukesh Chabbra, the director of our film, 'Kizzie Aur Manny', which is under production, till the internal complaints committee (ICC) of M-s Mukesh Chhabra Casting Company concludes its inquiry into the allegation," the statement read.