A complaint under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act was filed on Friday against playback singer and frontman of electronic folk fusion band Angarag Papon Mahanta for allegedly molesting a minor in a TV reality show in which he is one of the judges. Supreme Court lawyer Runa Bhuyan, who found the incident \u201cobjectionable\u201d, filed a complaint with the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights. The incident occurred after shooting of the reality show\u2019s Holi episode, and the video was live on Facebook. Papon, 42, put out a statement on Facebook, stating that if he was guilty, he would not have the video on his Facebook page. But, he added, \u201cthis is not to say I haven\u2019t made a mistake\u201d.<\/p>\n
In the complaint, Bhuyan states: \u201cI am shocked to see the behaviour of the said singer\u2026where he is seen to be applying colours on a minor girl and inappropriately kissing the said girl. On seeing the video, I am seriously concerned regarding the safety and security of minor girl(s) participating in reality shows across India.\u201d<\/p>\n
Papon posted on Facebook: \u201cAnyone who knows me would be aware that I am an extremely affectionate and expressive person\u2026. Please do remember that it is a video on my own facebook live and\u2026at least wonder why I would myself promote a video where I am \u2018apparently\u2019 doing all the unmentionable things I am being accused of.\u201d He also stated, \u201cI might have done it spontaneously but in today\u2019s environment, to touch a girl child, however innocent your thoughts are, is not advisable. I am sorry for that\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n
Speaking on the condition of anonymity, a few colleagues from the music industry hinted that alcohol or marijuana consumption could be responsible for Papon\u2019s reaction, and that he perhaps did not realise it could blow up so big.<\/p>\n
Singer Sona Mohapatra, a close associate, said she believes Papon was innocent in his intent but the video is not in good taste. \u201cPapon possibly should have been more aware of how this looks to a layman,\u201d she said. \u201cA formality and distance in such a space would have been better\u2026maybe boundaries should be maintained. Still I think the man is innocent \u2014 he just needs to be wiser.\u201d<\/p>\n
Subir Malik, lead keyboard player of Parikrama, said, \u201cIf he has done it, it\u2019s shameful, but if he hasn\u2019t, then no one can take back the disgusting things being said about him.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A complaint under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act was filed on Friday against playback singer and frontman of electronic folk fusion band Angarag Papon Mahanta for allegedly molesting a minor in a TV reality show in which he is one of the judges. Supreme Court lawyer Runa Bhuyan, who found the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22933,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[123],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22932","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-entertainment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22932","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22932"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22932\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22934,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22932\/revisions\/22934"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22933"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22932"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22932"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22932"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}