Singer names celebrities on #Metoo
Kannada music director owns up and apologises as Chinmayi says music director Raghu Dixit molested a singer as she was called for a song recording
CHENNAI: Playback singer Chinmayi Sreepaada of several hit songs has exposed more names of celebrities on her #Metoo campaign.
Among them is a Kannada music director also, who has owned up and apologised.
Music director Raghu Dixit molested a singer as she was called for a song recording, says Chinmayi, without revealing the victim’s name.
Late Wednesday night, Chinmayi poured out several names of Carnatic music celebrities.
The singer, who earlier accused national award winning lyricist Vairamuthu, tweeted a list of such celebrities who she says violated their students. She wrote: “BM Sundaram, Pappu Venugopal Rao, Sunil Kothari, Lokanatha Sarma, TN Seshagopalan, Sasikiran, Ravikiran, OS Thyagarajan. My inbox is crawling with stories from people. For you too the #Timesup.”
She also said: “Stop assaulting young girls. The stench from the Carnatic Classical scene is worse than I imagined it.” “OS Thyagarajan his Abheri and him sexually assaulting kids,” she has tweeted, quoting a girl whom she doesn’t name.
“This girl is from a musical family I personally know. I wish he goes to jail.”
Mandolin player U Rajesh is another target. Chinmayi wrote, “A story about Rajesh that the ‘mother’ doesn’t want to share. Says they will know if they know the story. I mean how many are paedophiles? 15-yearold daughter groped in the excuse of a music class. Throw away your instrument.”
Chinmayi also took a dig at Seshachari of famous vocalists, Hyderabad Brothers. There are accusations being made on social media by a few women, who don’t want to reveal their identity, against television personality Ramesh Prabha, actor John Vijay and ilm dance master Kalyan.
“Every educational institution or workplace must tell students/ new recruits of what to do, whom to ask for help when they feel violated.
For aeons have we ignored, asking girls and boys to shut up and not talk about ‘all that.’ Speak now. Speak later. Be kind on yourself,” wrote Chinmayi.
Raghu Dixit, the frontman for the Raghu Dixit Project, a multilingual folk music band, was accused of sexual harassment by two anonymous
women, whose accounts were shared by Chinmayi on Twitter. Dixit posted a long apology on Twitter where he admitted he was wrong as he “misread the situation.”
He said he had apologised to the woman immediately after the incident and will do so again in private.
Meanwhile Tamil actress Varalakshmi has retweeted Chinmayi’s post accusing actor Radha Ravi of sexual offence towards an unnamed woman.
What is interesting is that Ravi is her step-mother Radhika’s brother.
Ravi as well as Varalakshmi’s mother Radhika are children of MR Radha, celebrated villain of Tamil ilms and the man who once shot at legendary actor-chief minister MG Ramachandran. Varalakshmi’s fatheractor Sarathkumar, married Radhika after divorcing Varalakshmi’s mother Chaya in 2000.
Chinmayi also accused Sri Lankan cricketer Lasith Malinga of assaulting a woman at a Mumbai hotel during an Indian Premier League (IPL) season.