Arunabh Kumar - 'The Viral Fever' founder – sought sexual favours, accused of molestation; startup refutes charges

A former employee mentioned a series of events in a blog accusing Kumar of sexual assault.

Mumbai: Arunabh Kumar, founder of the popular digital entertainment network - The Viral Fever- has been accused of sexual harassment by multiple women, latest reports suggest.

According to a report in dnaindia.com, not one but seven other girls have come out, talking about his 'sexual favours' in the open. 

As per the report, it all started when an anonymous post on Medium.com brought pout the different side to the TVF founder. The post reads -

"I am abruptly called by Arunabh at 6.45 pm. I am in the local bank towards my home. He demands I come back to office. Apparently, I have not finished some part of my work. I reluctantly come back. There are three people in office. Two of them leave within five minutes of me coming in. And Arunabh is sitting on a chair in a casual manner. I walk up to him. He looks at me and asks me – “Chaturbhuj Sthan ka naam suni ho”? I am stunned. For non-starters, Chaturbhuj Sthan is the Red-Light district of Muzaffarpur. I didn’t respond. His second question – “Humko Chaturbhuj Sthan bahut pasand hai. Udhar commercial deals hoti hain. Tum bhi to commercial deal pe aayi ho”. I was getting where he was leading the discussion to. I avoided an interaction. I said “Arunabh, aap bade bhai hain. Meri tabiyat thodi theek nahi hai. Kya karna hai bataiye. Hum karke ghar jaayenge.” He suddenly holds my hand. Says “Madam, thoda role play karein”. The Ola team was meeting him and we were taking notes. He walks out of the meeting with some excuse and calls me for some notes. I walk up. He says it’s time we do a ‘quicky’. I am stunned. And I told him I will go to the police. He says, “Police to meri pocket me hai”. I walked out deciding never to come back. I walk up to my bosses and tell them that I don’t want to see him, they simply ask me to walk out. I tell (Naveen) Kasturia that this is what has happened, and he laughs it off. Says, ‘Duniya hai. Hota hai.’ I just wished I could kill myself."

However, the startup later put out a statement slamming all the allegations levelled against its founder and also promised ‘severe justice’ for the person who had written the post.

Earlier, Kumar rubbished the allegations of sexual harassment that have gone viral on social media.

In a statement, a TVF spokesperson said, "The article is completely ludicrous and defamatory against TVF and its team. All the allegations made against TVF and its team in the article are categorically false, baseless and unverified. We take a lot of pride in our team and in making TVF a safe workplace that is equally comfortable for women and men. We will leave no stone unturned to find the author of the article and bring them to severe justice for making such false allegations."