Actress sues three TV body heads for defamation

Mumbai: Actress Shilpa Shinde, who was playing one of the lead characters in the popular television serial Bhabhiji Ghar Par Hain, has filed a defamation case against three chiefs of various television associations, claiming they wrote to certain members of the entertainment industry asking them to not give work to her. The trio’s action was apparently in reaction to Mr Shinde’s abrupt departure from the serial. According to Ms Shinde, she could not continue with the serial as she was undergoing medical treatment.

Advocate Ninad Majumdar has filed the defamation case on behalf of Ms Shinde in Andheri metropolitan magistrate court against Harry Baweja, chairman of the Indian Films and TV producers’ council (IFTPC), Dilip Pithva, chairman and member of Federation of western India cine employees (FWICE) and Sushant Singh, chairman and member of Cine & Television Artistes’ Association (CINTAA).

According to the petition, Ms Shinde had informed the producers that she was unable to continue to shoot for the serial because of various reasons, including the fact that she was undergoing medical treatment. The petition has said that she had informed the producers of the serial through a letter dated March 3, 2016 that due to medical issues she could not continue the shoot.

The petitioner has further claimed that after her letter a meeting was held between her and IFTPC, FWICE and CINTAA. However, after discussions the federations allegedly announced that they have banned the complainant from working anywhere else and action would be taken against production houses that would employ her.

Commenting on Ms Shinde’s suit, Mr Sushant Singh said, “The federation IFTPC and CINTAA had jointly issued this letter because she had failed to honour her contract with the producer and the channel and when CINTAA directed her to report to shoot she was in violation of rules.”

Mr Singh further added, “She was in exclusive contract with producers and (the) channel but she wanted to take up another show and wanted to charge more money so we had no choice but to tell her to report back to the shoot. We told her if she wanted to leave the shoot give us three month’s notice and if you don’t want to do that too then you have to give compensation to the producers.”

Mr Singh said Ms Shinde refused to accept any condition, following which the federation asked its members not to show cooperation towards her. He said the letter had been issued a year back. “If our decision was wrong she should have done this long back,” he said.

“We never defamed her. On the contrary we have filed motion against her in the high court,” he added.