Sushant Singh Rajput denies harassment claims

Mumbai: Sushant Singh Rajput has been accused of sexual misconduct by his "Kizie Aur Manny" co-star Sanjana Sanghi. In his defence, the actor shared screenshots of their SMS conversation and called it a "smear campaign".

Sushant on Friday tweeted snapshots of his conversation with Sanjana from the first day to the last day of the film's shoot, and captioned it: "I feel sad to reveal personal information but it seems that there is no other way to state what was, in the midst of this curated and well-timed smear campaign.

"From the first till the last day of the shoot, this is what happened on the set with Sanjana."

Sanjana has accused the 32-year-old actor of behaving inappropriately on the sets of the movie, saying he made her feel "uncomfortable" with his "overly friendly behaviour" during the shoot in Jodhpur.

On Thursday, Twitteratis pointed at Sushant's missing blue verification tick on the micro-blogging platform following the claims.

However, Sushant on Friday clarified: "For all those deliberately using the missing of Twitter 'blue tick' to substantiate their false claims, allow me to tell you that it is not there since September 5. Get your facts checked before jumping to conclusions that you so eagerly want to.

The film's director and popular casting director Mukesh Chhabra has spoken out in support of Sushant.

"I totally stand by Sushant. No such incident happened on the sets and let's not have a Twitter trial and make an innocent person suffer for somebody else's ulterior motives. I had clarified this on twitter long back and I still maintain it," Chhabra, who too has been accused by a women of sexual harassment, tweeted.

The #MeToo movement in India started after actress and former beauty queen Tanushree Dutta in September recalled an unsavoury episode with veteran actor Nana Patekar from the sets of "Horn OK Pleassss" in 2008.