Madhuri Dixit refused to shoot molestation scene with Ranjeet in Prem Pratigyaa: 'She was sobbing, I was in a rush...'

Directed by Bapu, the 1989 romantic drama Prem Pratigyaa starred Mithun Chakraborty, Madhuri Dixit, Vinod Mehra, Satish Kaushik, Aruna Irani, and Ranjeet in the leading roles. It was a remake of the 1980 Tamil film Vandichakkaram that was headlined by  Sivakumar and Saritha. 

In a recent interview, Ranjeet revealed that Madhuri was frightened and cried a lot before shooting a molestation scene with him. Talking to Vickey Lalwani, the veteran actor said, "Prem Pratigya was the name of the film, Madhuri was new then. My image had been created as ‘ruthless killer, crude villain’. Girls and boys would fear me. Madhuri had heard about me, and she was panicking. We had a molestation scene together. Veeru Devgn was our fight master. The scene was that I had to molest her on a handcart. I was in rush for my other shoot and had no idea about her situation on set. I came to know about Madhuri later."

Ranjeet further added how Madhuri agreed to do the scene as he continued, "I realised she was crying. Then they consoled her, told her, ‘I was a good man’. Ultimately, she agreed to give the shot. Now, when we were giving the shot, I used to be very co-operative with my fellow artists. After the scene was cut, people clapped. She was sobbing, producer and others rushed to her and asked her, ‘Are you okay?’ She said, ‘I never realised anything. He never even touched me.'"

Madhuri Dixit was even nominated for Best Actress for Prem Pratigyaa at the 35th Filmfare Awards, but lost the award to Sridevi, who lifted the black statuette trophy for playing the twins Anju and Manju in Chaalbaaz. The other nominees were Bhagyashree for Maine Pyaar Kiya, Vijayashanti for Eeshwar, and Sridevi for Chandni.