The Kerala police have booked a prominent makeup artist in the Malayalam film industry for allegedly sexually harassing and stalking a woman who assisted him on a film set. This is the first such case to be filed based on the depositions made by several women in Malayalam cinema to the Justice Hema Committee, formed in 2017 to study the issues they face in the workplace.
The accused in the case is Saji Koratty, who has worked in notable films such as Oppam (2016), CIA: Comrade in America (2017), and Salute (2022).
The Ponkunnam police in Kottayam district confirmed to TNM that a First Information Report (FIR) has been filed under Sections 354A (sexual harassment), 354D (stalking), and 506 (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).
The case is being handled by the special investigation team (SIT) headed by IGP G Sparjan Kumar, formed to investigate cases registered in the aftermath of the release of the Hema Committee report. The team has recorded the statement of the complainant, who is a woman makeup artist based in Kollam.
Speaking to TNM, the complainant said that the incident happened several years ago, after the accused asked her for sexual favours and she said no. “He then started misbehaving with me on the film set, and I had called him out and questioned him on this. But later, as we were returning from the film set to our place of accommodation, he forced me to get out of the vehicle at midnight, leaving me stranded on the roadside. I tried and reached out to some other people from the production unit and they eventually helped me reach the place of stay,” she said.
The Hema Committee report, which was released on August 19, had unmasked a culture of systemic misogyny, power abuse, and sexual harassment in Malayalam cinema. It emboldened several women to publicly share their traumatic experiences in the industry, triggering another #MeToo wave in Kerala. TNM had earlier extensively reported on the misogyny and gendered power imbalances prevalent especially among makeup artists and hairstylists in Malayalam cinema, and how their trade union Film Employees Federation of Kerala (FEFKA) have been resorting to stonewalling complaints and silencing the complainants.