Revathy Sampath Accuses AMMA Gen Secretary Siddique Of Sexual Abuse: 'After The Assault He Stood...'
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Actress Revathy Sampath has accused veteran Malayalam actor Siddique, who is also the general secretary of the Association of Malayalam Movie Artists (AMMA), of sexual misconduct, in the wake of Hema Committee Report. During a recent media interaction, Sampath claimed that the incident occurred when she was 21 years old. She revealed that Siddique initially reached out to her on Facebook, addressing her as “Mole,” a term commonly used in Kerala to refer to a young girl or daughter.
“After completing my Plus Two, I had a terrible experience. Siddique sent me messages on Facebook. I had come to discuss a film. This incident occurred when I was 21 years old. He first approached me by calling me ‘Mole.’ There was abuse from Siddique’s side. During the discussion, he sexually abused me. The face he shows now is not the one I saw back then,” Revanthy said. Siddique resigned as AMMA’s general secretary on Sunday. AMMA vice president Jayan Cherthala confirmed it.
Calling him a “criminal”, the actress alleged that Siddique abused her both physically and mentally. She said, “He assaulted me, both physically and mentally. Siddique is a criminal. I went through severe mental trauma. It even affected my professional life. No system stood by me. It took me a long time to speak out. After the assault, Siddique acted as if nothing had happened and stood before me like it was normal. Everyone responded as if it was a common occurrence. It felt like they all did it knowingly.”
Revathy said that to escape the situation, she fled. She added, “I ran away to escape. I responded as best as I could at that age. He said there was nothing I could do. I fled, managed to get into an auto, and escaped.”
Meanwhile, the Association of Malayalam Movie Artistes (AMMA) responded to the Justice Hema Committee report on working conditions and sexual exploitation in the Malayalam film industry on Friday. AMMA welcomed the report but denied the presence of powerful groups and dismissed the casting couch claims.
“I have been in the industry for the past four decades and I can say with absolute conviction no power group, as mentioned in the report, exists because this is a film industry and no such groups can exist, neither there is a casting couch… We have no qualms that if there is any crime anywhere, it has to be probed and we want to book the wrongdoers if there are any,” Siddique had said as quoted by IANS.
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