Not against women working: Mukesh Khanna after backlash over controversial #MeToo remark

Image Courtesy: Instagram/@iammukeshkhanna

New Delhi: Actor Mukesh Khanna of 'Shaktiman' fame, who is being slammed for his controversial remark regarding the #MeToo movement, has issued a clarification on social media, saying, "I am not against women working". To prove his stance, he has shared a video of his interview for which he was called out. 

He captioned it, "I am not against women working. As I said let me show you my full interview taken by someone from which this "vivadit bayan" has been taken to malign me that I mean "this" which I don't mean. I was just commenting on how MeToo can happen. You can see yourself in this interview how I respect women."

Take a look at his post here:

View this post on Instagram

As I said let me show you my full interview taken by someone from which this “ Vivadit Bayan” has been taken to malign me that I mean “ This”which I don’t mean. I was just commenting on how Me too can happen. You can see yourself in this interview how I respect women.

A post shared by Mukesh Khanna (@iammukeshkhanna) on Oct 31, 2020 at 9:24am PDT

Mukesh Khanna courted controversy after he claimed that the #MeToo movement happened because women tried "walking shoulder to shoulder with men".

In an interview given to The Filmy Charcha, he said in Hindi, "Men and women are different. The job of a woman is to take care of the house, pardon me as I say certain things. The problem of #MeToo began when women started working. Today, women talk about walking shoulder-to-shoulder with men." The 62-year-old actor added that both men and women have their own set of responsibilities.

"People talk about women's liberation, but let me tell you that's where the problem begins. The first person who suffers is the child because he doesn't have a mother (around him at home), he sits and watches TV with his nanny all day. It all began when women started saying that they want to do what men do. No, a man is a man and a woman is a woman."

Mukesh Khanna's "misogynistic" comments drew sharp criticism from social media users. 

The #MeToo movement gained prominence in India in 2018 when actress Tanushree Dutta accused Nana Patekar of sexual harassment. Since then, several women in the Hindi film industry have named and shamed alleged perpetrators.