Veena Malik has claimed that the stress caused by the FHM India scandal aged her by almost ten years. The Pakistani model, is suing the publishers of the magazine for doctoring her photograph and making it appear nude for their latest edition.
However, the Bigg Boss 4 contestant recently revealed that since she filed her lawsuit, she has been threatened with character defamation if she did not drop the charges.
"I feel completely cheated. They’ve added ten years to my age. ‘They threatened to sue me if I don’t keep quiet," the Daily Mail quoted her as saying.
The 33-year-old has claimed that she was wearing hot pants, which were removed by Photoshop on the cover of FHM India.
Malik had appeared naked on the cover of the December issue of FHM India with just her arms and legs covering her modesty, sporting a tattoo of the initials ‘ISI’ on her arm, a reference to Pakistan’s intelligence agency.
The image had sparked huge outrage in her homeland, with her father disowning her and asking her to be punished.
"The image we shot was completely different to the one on the cover. I was wearing hot pants and they promised me they would cover my upper body with multiple tattoos.
"Instead, they removed the hot pants," she said.
The actress has alleged that the editor-in-chief Kabeer Sharma and the journalist who interviewed her were not responding to her calls even though prior to the shoot they would converse with her regularly.
"I did not sign any contract and refused to until I was given final approval of the images. I was never sent the pictures but I was assured they were the same shots taken on the shoot in November.
"I was cool with those pictures because I felt they were artistic and beautiful. They should have waited for my authorisation but they didn’t.
"There was only one week between the shoot and publication - they were obviously in a rush to print them without my consent," she said.
Meanwhile, Sharma has strongly denied the allegations that the pictures are doctored and that the model has been threatened, insisting that Malik has given contradictory accounts of the shoot.
"It’s important to note Ms Malik has been dragging the magazine’s name through muck by making false and baseless allegations and we look at it very, very seriously," he said.
"I invite Ms Malik to furnish one shred of evidence, SMS or a witness to support her allegations which are as concocted as the ones she’s been making all week.
"No one in FHM has had any conversation with Ms Malik directly or indirectly to make this "imagined threat".
“The one message that was sent to her was one that told her she could call the office landline if she wanted to have a conversation.
“Ms Malik was more than comfortable with the filming, it was only when the cover and the grenade shots were done was the videographer asked to stop filming to make the team more comfortable (not her).
“She did not even once ask him to stop filming,” he added.
Malik had meanwhile claimed that no such video was taken and that when she noticed filming taking place, when she was fully clothed, she asked them to stop as it was not in line with the previous agreement to only shoot images.
“The one message that was sent to her was one that told her she could call the office landline if she wanted to have a conversation.
“Ms Malik was more than comfortable with the filming, it was only when the cover and the grenade shots were done was the videographer asked to stop filming to make the team more comfortable (not her).
“She did not even once ask him to stop filming,” he added.
Malik had meanwhile claimed that no such video was taken and that when she noticed filming taking place, when she was fully clothed, she asked them to stop as it was not in line with the previous agreement to only shoot images.