Woman Calls Choreographer Ganesh Acharya 'Womaniser', Accuses Him of Forcing Her to Watch Adult Videos

Choreographer Ganesh Acharya has been accused by a woman choreographer of depriving her of work, demanding commission and forcing her to watch adult videos. The complaint was filed by a 33-year-old at Maharashtra Women's Commission and Amboli Police Station.

A copy of the document obtained by IANS claimed that after Acharya became the general secretary of Indian Films and Television Choreographer Association (IFTCA), he would frequently call the accuser at the IFTCA office at Veera Desai, Andheri (West) and Mukti Rehearsal Hall.

According to the legal document, Acharya said that whenever coordination of any song was done, she was asked to pay Rs 500 per dancer to Acharya, else she was not allowed to do any coordination in the industry. As she could not pay, he later asked her to be his assistant which she denied as she wanted to work independently.

The complainant also claimed that whenever accuser reached Acharya's office she would find him watching porn videos.

"Whenever I used to reach his office for any work I always found him watching porn videos and he even asked me to watch the porn videos. He also stated that even I will enjoy watching porn videos.

"Listening to this I lost my temper and I knew he was a womaniser and involved in gambling and cricket batting too so I will complaint against you to the association and police (sic.)," it read.

"On January 26th January, 2020, there was a SGM of IFTCA at Raheja Classic Club, behind Infinity Mall, Andheri West. I reached there at 1.00 PM to put my points forward to the IFTCA in the SGM...

"I was waiting at the corridor at 3.00 PM during this time Ganesh Acharya, Jayshree Kelkar and Preeti Lad reached at the same place... Ganesh Acharya started screaming on me..(sic.)"

She also said that Kelkar and Lad physically assaulted her.

"After this I tried making him understand that I am a member and I have come to put my points forward... Listening to this he got angry and told Jayshree to hit 'thappad' and use laat (kick) and throw her away... After this Jayshree Kelkar and Preeti Lad started hitting me (sic.)."

On Tuesday morning, ANI tweeted about the same and wrote, "33yr-old woman choreographer, has filed a complaint against Ganesh Acharya, GenSecyIndian Film & Television Choreographers Assoc at state's Women's Commission & Amboli PS accusing him of depriving her of work in the film industry, demanding commission & forcing her to watch adult videos."

This is not the first time that the choreographer has faced harassment charges. Earlier, when Tanushree Dutta had accused Nana Patekar of misbehaving with her on the set of Horn Ok Pleassss in 2008, in which she was supposed to do a special dance number, she had also lashed out at Acharya. She had also accused Acharya (who was the choreographer of the song) along with film’s director Rakesh Sarang and producer Samee Siddique of ganging up against her and witnessing everything happening, without doing anything about it.

Speaking about the allegations, Acharya had then told the media, "I would like to highlight this that the Tanushree case is completely false and a dramatic story. When I choreograph some song, then the artist, along with the dancers' crew, do rehearsals about five days prior to the shooting. If any harassment had happened, how come other actors and crew members were not aware about it?"

(with inputs from IANS)

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