Alok Nath becomes a different person when drunk; his Dr Jekyll-Mr Hyde personality is known to many: Renuka Shahane

With Vinta Nanda accusing Alok Nath of raping her twice, many other actresses came in front and spoke how Alok Nath harassed them. Recently one of the crew member of Hum Saath Saath Hain-Renuka Shahane who essayed the character of Alok Nath’s daughter in the film, shared her experience on working with Alok Nath and thanked her stars that she never went for an outdoor shoot with him.

“My experience working with Alok Nath has been very good but I have heard that he has two faces. People say that he can’t really handle his drinks. When he is drunk, he becomes a totally different person. His Dr Jekyl and Mr Hyde personality is known to his colleagues. I heard many such incidents after I had finished working with him in Hum Aapke Hain Koun and tele-serial Imtihaan, in which he played my father,” says the actress.

“In Imtihaan, our father-daughter bond was so strong and it was so wonderful working with him, but then I started hearing stories that he harasses women when he is drunk. It was so shocking for me because I couldn’t put these two faces together. Deepika Deshpande (film and television actress) had mentioned about this to me when we were doing 9 Malabar Hill together sometime in the late ’90s. Couple of other young actresses, 17 or 18 year olds, had mentioned that ki party mein badi badtamazee karte hain (he misbehaves with them in parties) and one has to keep away from him. That he misbehaves does not come as a surprise to me now but the extent to which he went (referring to Nanda’s case) is really shocking. What Vinta has gone through is heart-rending. There are many others who must have been harassed but they are not coming out in the open,” says Shahane.

“But yes, there are some people who are crass even on the sets and they may be great actors. Let’s put it very clearly. Just because you have played a saint, have been principled on screen, doesn’t mean you are principled in real life. You are just acting the part. We are taken in by that image. But I want the men also to speak up. Even the best intentioned men… Why can’t they come out and say, Yes, this happened’. The least one can do is listen to the other side,” Renuka Shahane added.

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