Farhan Akhtar addresses sexual harassment allegations on cousin, Sajid Khan

Bollywood actor and director Farhan Akhtar came forward breaking silence on the sexual harassment allegations hurled the way of his cousin and famed filmmaker, Sajid Khan.

The 41-year-old Rock On actor while addressing an event in Mumbai titled ‘We the Woman’, stated that he became subject to conflicted emotions when he first heard the news against his cousin.

“It was surprise, disappointment and strangely, because when it’s a member of your family, you also feel a certain level of guilt. It’s happened to all of us in the past when we hear something like this and say ‘but how come someone so close to him didn’t know’. “The truth is I didn’t. If I did know I would’ve spoken about it way before the story broke. There was this certain guilt about that, how could this be going on and I had no idea. So there were conflicted emotions,” he stated.

The Dil Dhadakne Do actor who has been an advocate of the #MeToo movement went on to add: “Every time something like this has happened in the public domain, I’ve been very vocal with my opinion. When it came to someone within my family, I felt silence on that front would be very, very hypocritical.”

Moreover, he stated: “So pretty much on the first day when three women came out and spoke, I felt it was important for me to speak out. Sajid, being my brother, I need to now work with him, try to figure out how he can see this thing through and how it is that he can make the women who have been affected by his actions, somehow feel better.”

Shedding light on the the experiences disclosed to him by a few of the victims, Akhtar continued: “here were two-three women who got in touch with me privately to say ‘listen you should know whatever is being said is true and he has behaved in a similar way with us as well’. These are the people I’ve known for 12, 15, 20 years and meet them very often but nobody ever mentioned this to me. I asked them why didn’t you ever tell me?”

“If someone has behaved badly with a woman and she hasn’t spoken about it for ten, 20 or 30 years, it’s her prerogative when she wants to speak. Even if someone tells me privately, like these three women, I cannot take their names. Can I go to the public with that? I can’t because she will be answerable then for the rest of her life and may be she first want to be. It’s a woman’s agency,” he stated further.

The Housefull filmmaker was accused of sexual misconduct by actor Saloni Chopra and a journalist. Soon after the allegations, Khan resigned from his post as director of the upcoming Housefull 4.