Bollywood superstar Akshay Kumar‘s defamation notice to a YouTuber from Bihar, seeking Rs 500 crore in damages for making baseless allegations against him in Sushant Singh Rajput‘s case is the latest in series of defamation cases from the industry:
Lyricist Javed Akhtar early this month filed a criminal complaint against actor Kangana Ranaut in a local court for allegedly making defamatory and baseless comments against him in TV interviews.
While Kumar has sent a notice, Akhtar had filed his complaint before the Andheri Metropolitan Magistrate, seeking action against Ranaut under the relevant provisions of the IPC for defamation for allegedly dragging his name in Rajput’s death and in relation to her own legal and public battle with Hrithik Roshan.
Filmmaker Mahesh Bhatt and his brother Mukesh Bhatt filed a defamation suit in the Bombay High Court in October against aspiring actor Luvienna Lodh for making defamatory, slanderous and false allegations against them.
The Bhatts have sought Rs one crore in damages from Lodh and also an order restraining her from making any such false claims in future.
Actor Richa Chadha in September had filed a defamation suit against an actor named Payal Ghosh after her name was dragged in a defamatory manner by Ghosh, who has accused filmmaker Anurag Kashyap of sexual harassment.
Chadha’s defamation suit names a news channel and Kamaal R Khan as well. The case was settled after Ghosh apoligised to Chadha.
In 2017, Bollywood actor Aditya Pancholi and his wife Zarina Wahab filed a criminal defamation complaint against Kangana Ranaut and her sister Rangoli at the Andheri magistrate’s court.
Ranaut had alleged in the past that she was in an abusive relationship with Pancholi, when she was a newbie in Bollywood.
Pancholi claimed that the actor had been maligning him for years, but when she named him and spoke in a derogatory manner about him on television, he decided to file the complaint.
In October this year, top Bollywood filmmakers and industry unions filed a lawsuit against two popular TV news channels, asking them to refrain from defaming the film industry.
