Is Rekha married to Sanjay Dutt? Her biographer denies rumours

Yasser Usman, the writer of Rekha - The Untold Story, has denied the rumours that Rekha applies vermillion in Sanjay Dutt’s name. Here’s what he said.

Yasser Usman, the writer of Rekha - The Untold Story, has denied reports that the actress was married to Sanjay Dutt and applies vermillion in his name.

Rekha and Sanjay Dutt worked together in 1984 film Zameen Aasmaan when these rumours started.

Many publications referred writer Usman’s book as the source of the news.

However, Usman has now denied the news in a conversation with HT. He says, “This is wrong. Nothing of this sort has been mentioned in my book. People don’t read properly.”

He narrates the incident quoted in his book, “Rekha and Sanjay Dutt were working in a film together, probably Zameen Aasmaan (1984). The rumours of their affair surfaced at that time. In fact, some went on to say that they got married. These rumours became so strong that Sanjay Dutt had to deny the allegations in a magazine. It was an official denial.”

“There wasn’t any marriage. This became big only because Dutt had to deny it officially,” adds Usman.

In fact, Usman’s book has these lines: During these years a succession of names came to be associated with her: Shailendra Singh, Kamal Haasan, producer Rajeev Kumar, even Sanjay Dutt. One fine day, out of the blue, came the news of her marriage with Sanjay Dutt. An unfair rumour, because she was sincerely helping him recover from a rough patch. And the release of their film, Zameen Aasman, gained from the rumour. Sanjay Dutt had to actually issue a formal denial of their rumoured marriage.

These days when fake news has become a monstrous problem and fact-checking has taken a backseat, Yasser Usman can be termed the latest victim of click-bait journalism.

The author tweets at Twitter/@nawabjha