A day after accusations of sexual harassment surfaced against comedian and former All India Bakchod employee (AIB) Utsav Chakraborty, the organisation has issued a second statement on social media.
The apology comes after intense social media trolling and accusations of AIB’s involvement in shielding the accused despite knowledge of his actions. AIB had initially said that Chakraborty stopped working with them in 2016. However, in the second apology, they owned up to working with him even after 2016.
A statement ; We’re sorry pic.twitter.com/Lpa9HKyORb
— All India Bakchod (@AllIndiaBakchod) October 5, 2018
By harassment, we meant that Utsav called up the person, cried, apologised, putting her in an uncomfortable position. Again, to clarify: this incident was only about the unsolicited picture in question. None of the other allegations were known to us. — All India Bakchod (@AllIndiaBakchod) October 5, 2018
Taking full responsibility for their actions, AIB owned up to the fact that they had continued to work with Chakraborty despite CEO Tanmay Bhat being aware of at least one accusation against him. The note also said that a victim wrote to Bhat who then had a personal conversation with Chakraborty. This apparently led to further ‘harassment’. AIB allegedly did not take any action since the victim did not wish to pursue the matter further.
I’ve let a lot of people down recently. I’m sorry. I messed up. https://t.co/C58NgT5GOy
— Tanmay Bhat (@thetanmay) October 5, 2018
In the note, AIB wrote that they were sorry to all those whom they have let down and they should have completely stopped working with Chakraborty at the first sign of trouble.
The note added that apart from Bhat, no other members of AIB were aware of Chakraborty’s transgressions, though several members had heard stories of his unprofessional behaviour from common sources in the industry.
However, the note was heavily slammed on Twitter with many claiming the apology was too little, too late. Some people also dug up old posts by Bhat and other AIB members such as Rohan Joshi.
“We messed up” & “We’re sorry” is not enough.
When you harass someone you steal a part of them – something which’ll never be the same again even after you keep issuing such half-hearted nonsensical apologies and blame mental health or oversight for everything.#UnsubscribeAIB
— Am I Write? (@WordsSlay) October 5, 2018
“Chalta hai bro” attitude. This is 100% complicity. And they’re apologising only because they were outed and caught red handed. It’s damaging them hence have to issue the apology, else they don’t give two effs about what the victims went through. Else they would’ve done something — Am I Write? (@WordsSlay) October 5, 2018
Yatha Raja Tatha Praja
Yatha Tanmay Tatha Utsav pic.twitter.com/n7QZ6aI9AZ— नंदिता ठाकुर (@nanditathhakur) October 5, 2018
Did u miss this one? pic.twitter.com/1ROoBdzxJp — doctor doctor! (@icedtea28) October 5, 2018
Two explanation in Two days !!!
1) Yesterday “Utsav left us in 2016”, when this lie was called out , now they gaslight
2) Fact is all these pervs are scared that they might be next https://t.co/obDHROfFx4
— Jiggs 🇮🇳 (@Sootradhar) October 5, 2018