Salman Khan is “not apologetic” over his rape remark in his reply to the National Commission for Women, its Chairperson Lalitha Kumaramangalam said today, noting the panel is looking into it. “Salman Khan has sent a reply and it is not apologetic in tenor. We now need to decide what we are going to do next. We have to look at both what comes under our mandate and what are the legalities involved.”
We are not going to give out the details of Salman Khan’s reply now. We need to first go through it in detail, along with our lawyers. Only then will both his reply and what we are going to do next will be made public,” she said.
The reply was e-mailed to NCW through a lawyer last evening while the NCW notice was sent directly to the Bollywood actor to his residence. “The reply has come from his lawyer, which means it is a legal reply. So we can’t just reply off the cuff,” Kumaramangalam said.
The NCW chief had earlier said that if the actor did not give a satisfactory reply then he could be asked to appear before the Commission. Calling the comment “callous and condemnable”, NCW had issued Salman a notice last week, giving him five days to reply, over a comment he made comparing himself with a raped woman when quizzed about the gruelling shoot for the movie “Sultan”. “We have sent him a letter asking for explanation in seven days. We have said that he should give a public apology,” the NCW chief had then said.
The Maharashtra State Commission for Women (MSCW) chief, Vijaya Raharkar has also reacted to the controversy. She told ANI: