The Nagpur bench of the Bombay High Court has granted Interim relief to actor Vijay Raaz, who is facing charges of outraging the modesty and stalking a film crew member. The high court has directed that all proceedings in the criminal case, pending before the Magistrate Court at Gondia district against Raaz be stayed. The 51-year-old actor has filed a petition seeking quashing and setting aside the First Information Report (FIR) registered against him on November 3, 2020, at the Ramnagar police station of Gondia.
Raaz in his petition has stated that the complaint registered against him by the woman film crew member is based on "imagination with ill intention to malign the image and gain popularity at the cost of a senior actor". According to Raaz, there is no offence that has been committed by him. According to the Toofan star, sexual harassment would be met only if there is a physical contact and advances involving unwelcoming and explicit sexual overtures or there is a demand or request for sexual favours showing pornography against the will or making sexually coloured remarks which would attribute to sexual harassment. The FIR was registered by an assistant director of Sherni. Raaz states that he was visiting Gondia for the first time and was new to the sets, and it is the role of the assistant director to guide him about the call timings and other detail. According to Raaz, as per the work allotted to her by the production house, it was her duty to keep Raaz informed about the call time of the shoot for each day of the shoot.
Moreover, it was the role and responsibility of the woman to make all necessary arrangements which are necessary for the actor like setting up the vanity van, arrangements of costume, look, get up, including wig and make up for the day and giving the brief about the scenes. Raaz has stated that the allegations of the woman assistant director are absolutely false and concocted which would be clear from the fact that on October 27, 2020, the schedule for the entire day was shared by the woman with Raaz. Moreover, the call time as per the production company would clearly show that the woman and Raaz were at the shoot location which was about 125 km from the hotel. So the allegation of Raaz keeping his hand over the shoulder of the assistant director near the lift of the hotel gateway after he had returned from morning walk is baseless, concocted and imaginary says Raaz. The actor also claimed that the woman had already withdrawn the allegation against him before the internal complaints' committee of the production company.