In the midst of the #MeToo wave happening in India, an old video of Salman Khan has resurfaced in which he addresses allegations of physical abuse against Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, his then girlfriend.
In the video, a journalist questions him if he’s ever hit a woman (Rai had shared in the past that he had been physically violent with her on multiple occasions); Salman’s response?
“I mean there was a journalist Prabhu Chawla who asked me this long time ago, so I just banged the table and he got startled, the table really broke.”
He further added, “I mean, if I hit somebody, it’s obviously a fight, I am going to be angry. I’m going to whack and give it my best shot. I don’t think she would’ve survived it.”
In an earlier interview, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan accused Salman of cheating on her and misbehaving with her. Talking of the physical abuse she said, “After we broke up, he (Salman) would call me and talk rubbish. There were times when Salman got physical with me, luckily without leaving any marks. And, I would go to work as if nothing had happened.”
Aishwarya and Salman are said to fall in love while shooting for Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam in 1999. It was after 2 years, things started getting rough and the two finally called it off in March 2002. Later, Aishwarya accused Salman of violent behavior.
The #MeToo movement became strong in India after Tanushree Dutta’s allegations of sexual harassment on Nana Patekar and Ganesh Acharya. Recently, names like Vikas Bahl, Tanmay Bhatt, Gursimran Khamba, Utsav Chakraborty and Alok Nath have come up publically for sexual harassment and not acting on complaints against alleged assaulters.
