Kolkata: A 20-year-old media science student at Heritage College in Kolkata took to Facebook this week to accuse her former professor and theatre mentor of rape and sexual assault.The professor in question, well-known theatre actor and scholar Sudipto Chatterjee, joined the department at the private college around two years ago to teach performance studies. The woman said in a post that went viral that she had auditioned for the role of Lysistrata and was consequently picked to play the lead role of Chatterjee’s own production, ‘Bhadroja’.According to the post, Chatterjee called her to his house to “teach diaphragm breathing”, promising it “wasn’t sexual”, only to eventually touch her inappropriately.The woman wrote: “It is an open secret in the circuit, that Sudipto Chatterjee, has been a serial sexual molester. There have been too many victims, however, he always had gotten away with this because the survivors couldn’t come out with their traumatic experiences.”In response to the allegations, Chatterjee, who has been detained by the police after an FIR was filed, has said: “I am innocent, this is not the end of it. I will respond to these allegations legally and will not resort to Facebook to express myself.”Also read: Govt Dissolves #MeToo Panel Quietly, Refuses to Divulge Details: ReportThe professor was arrested by Kolkata police on Friday after complaints were filed by two women at the Phoolbagan and Beliaghata police stations. He is expected to be produced in the Sealdah district court today. “Chatterjee has been arrested and will be produced in court on Saturday,” said Joint Commissioner of Police (Crime) Murlidhar Sharma.The third-year student’s post has over 1,600 shares and 2,000 reactions and is titled ‘Rape/Trigger Warning. Rape/ sexual assault in academia’.Chatterjee resigned a day after the student filed a complaint with the college authorities. Speaking to The Wire, he said that the Internal Complaints Committee “coerced” him into resigning by giving him two options: either resign and take the “honourable way” out or wait till the college fired him.According to the third-year student, the two students who accompanied her to the administrative building were asked to leave, after which she was told the matter would be solved internally without attracting media attention.During the second meeting, which took place on Wednesday, the woman found out that Chatterjee had “resigned”.The woman told The Wire, “He always had a tendency of giving any topic a sexual tinge and making it about the female body. He also shamed anyone who came out against him, just like I did, narrating how they falsely accused him. Before I went over to his place, he gave me no intimation as to what he would teach me. His touch came as a surprise to me.”On his part, Chatterjee claims to have sent her elaborate text messages and notes explaining the diaphragm’s role in the process, “expecting her to internalise it and reflect in her performance which did not happen”.“She asked for help and repeatedly said that she wanted to learn. In her statement, she wished me a horrible death but after this alleged incident, she did more than six performances with me, came over to my house – often alone – and behaved normally. In fact, in January, she said she was an atheist until she met me, meaning she compared me with god, and that one day she would finally be able to express her gratitude to me. I gave her more responsibilities when she wanted to be assistant director in my group and delivered. Thus, I do not know what she means by this post,” Chatterjee said.Also read: Talking About #MeToo – a List of DefinitionsThe Heritage College authorities clarified over the phone that, at first, the matter was treated as workplace harassment even though the third-year student had tried to file the complaint as a student of the institution.As opposed to workplace guidelines, the University Grants Commission states that a student representative must be present at all meetings. The college authorities have remained tight-lipped about the matter: “Our hands are tied. Whatever Chatterjee has stated to the media is his version. That is all we can say.”The student told The Wire that she was not alone in her experience. “The others are brutally damaged, they have taken years to process the trauma.”Chatterjee however, responded that “it is not in my taste to reply to that diatribe.”Chatterjee spoke to The Wire about the controversial exercise which made the third-year student feel violated, saying that it is important “to retain more oxygen in one’s lungs to help with voice projection”. He claimed that this method was taught to him before he left for his education abroad and in the institutions where he taught, this exercise found its manifestation in some form or the other.“When I try teaching this to another man, like Sraman Chatterjee, I get thanked profusely because it helped him with his solo performances. I believe this is part of theatre performances and directing,” he said.Past instancesAfter the third-year student’s post, three other women also came forward to accuse the theatre personality of sexually harassing them.Amrita Halder, a 23-year-old Rabindra Bharati alumnus, took to Facebook to write about how, upon sharing a similar story with her peers about the incident, she was removed from her role in his theatre group Spectator.On the other hand, Srabasti Ghosh, a 24-year-old freelance performer, who also posted on her Facebook page, emphasised the grey areas that accompany “abuse-consent-assault” and how these concepts overlap. In a conversation with The Wire, she said that she was only 20 when she was “manipulated” by Chatterjee into a relationship that lasted almost two-and-a-half years.She admitted that if he counters her arguments by asking why she had not terminated the relationship sooner, she would have no “concrete answer”. However, she alleged that every aspect of the relationship, including the decision of staying in it, was decided by Chatterjee. She alleged that he also pursued other women while being in a relationship with her.When asked about Ghosh’s allegations, Chatterjee told The Wire: “It was a relationship where I helped her with everything that came her way, from getting into Ambedkar University to teaching her what performance entails. Not being loyal has nothing to do with rape and molestation.”Rajeswari Paul, an MPhil student at the Centre for Studies in the Social Sciences, faced the same fate as the third-year student did. As an old acquaintance of the professor, she had wanted his help to improve her skills as a freelance performer.She told The Wire, “I tried to overcome the trauma alone when the incident took place in May 2019. I did not have the strength to combat his financial and social position. I stopped talking to him even when he tried to pretend that everything was normal. When people accused [the third-year student] of lying, I decided to come out with my story.”She called Chatterjee’s behaviour a “technique” to trap women, capitalising on his erudition. She alleged that he asked her to “take off her shirt” to explain the diaphragm breathing process better. When she was asked to lie down and was “touched inappropriately”, she said, she protested.Ghosh, Halder and Paul have consented to their names being used in this story.“I went on stage at the age of three and have been in this profession for almost 50 years now. Why would I do this now? If I did, I would have done it a long time ago, when I was young and foolish. This is character assassination of the highest order. Rajeswari herself asked for help and I have messages that clarify I asked her if she was comfortable with the physicality of the process. In spite of not being in any of my plays, she came to me of her own accord,” said Chatterjee.“This feels like mob lynching and I feel victimised by this social media trial. However, I love my students but they are young and are fuelled by passion. Democracy guarantees that the law has to hear both sides. My conscience is clean and in spite of this, if the law finds me guilty, then so be it. An offer to me as the lead role of a web series was revoked yesterday and I have lost my job. I do not know what the future holds,” he told The Wire.The three women and the student met on Thursday to discuss the course of action. On Friday, the student and Paul filed an FIR against Chatterjee. A protest march also took place at Ranu Chaya Manch, Academy of Fine Arts, called ‘Survivors’ Call: Talk Listen Discuss’ on Friday afternoon.Also read: In #MeToo Email to Subodh Gupta, Art Collective Grappled with Need to Oust Friend and FounderStudents in the department of media science are now boycotting classes “until justice is served”, Sulagna Maitra, a third-year student, said. “A lot of students are angry that he was given the option of quitting and leaving quietly. The ICC was not formed according to UGC guidelines.”Before his tenure in Kolkata, Chatterjee has been a faculty member of educational institutions all over the world such as New York University, Tufts University, University of California Berkeley in the United States, Loughborough University in the UK, and Jawaharlal Nehru University, Centre for Studies in the Social Sciences and National School of Drama in India.Exactly two years earlier, in October 2017, filmmaker and theatre director Premangshu Roy was accused of sexually harassing women at his workshop conducted by Natyasanskriti Charchakendra.In May 2018, the creative director of Kolkata’s youth-based theatre group, Mad About Drama (MAD) was accused of sexual harassment by a former member, following which several other women came forward to narrate his inappropriate behaviour towards young and naive newcomers.Tannistha Sinha is an MA student from Jadavpur University.
