Dileep row refuses to die down, protest outside Mohanlal's house

Kochi: The row over Dileep's re-induction into the Malayalam film artistes' body AMMA refused to die down even after he said he would not return till being cleared in the case of abducting and sexually assaulting an actress, with Youth Congress activists on Friday taking out a protest march to the home of the association's chief, superstar Mohanlal, near here.

Shouting slogans against Mohanlal, the protesters demanded that an actor of his stature should not resort to any sort of measure that will affect womanhood by siding with people who are accused and he should not have taken the decision to revoke Dileep's suspension.

Mohanlal was not present in the house at the time, and some of the protesters, who tried to barge into the compound, were stopped from creating any damage.

Meanwhile in the state capital, on hearing about the Youth Congress protest march, angry activists of the Mohanlal Fans Association took out a march and said if anyone dares to attack their dear superstar, they will not sit idle.

"He is only the (AMMA) President and the decision is taken by the Committee and the Annual General Body Meeting... why is he alone being targeted. If this is not stopped, we will also be forced to act," warned a fan.

Mohanlal, who took over as President of Association of Malayalam Movie Artists (AMMA) last Sunday, and the new team in their first decision revoked Dileep's suspension which was ordered by the association's Executive Committee last year, saying it was done against the by-laws of AMMA.

The decision led to a huge public outcry against Mohanlal and subsequently four leading actress resigned from AMMA while three other actresses wrote to the AMMA General Secretary to call an emergency committee meeting on July 13 or 14 to discuss this issue.

Several state ministers and leaders from both the Congress and the BJP slammed the decision of AMMA and it was against this backdrop that Dileep wrote to the AMMA General Secretary on Thursday, saying he did not want to return until he is exonerated.

In a related development, the ruling Communist Party of India-Marxist's State Secretariat meeting gave a clean chit to party MP and veteran comedy artiste Innocent and other actor-turned legislators - state legislator Mukesh and K.B. Ganesh Kumar, whose party is a friendly ally of the Pinarayi Vijayan-led LDF government, by deciding not to seek any explanation from them on this issue.

While Innocent was the outgoing AMMA President after an 18-year term, the other two are Vice Presidents of the body and were facing flak from several quarters that they were using their political influence to give Dileep an easy return to AMMA.

Vijayan, who is yet to make any statement on this issue, shooed away the media on Friday when they came to ask his comment on the Dileep row.