The allegation, as reported
Media reports have revived an old account from the making of Prem Dharam. According to a News24 report cited by News18, Vinod Khanna and Dimple Kapadia were shooting an intimate scene when director Mahesh Bhatt called “cut”. The actor, the account claims, continued kissing and holding her after the instruction.
Crew members and Bhatt are said to have separated the two. Kapadia was described as shocked by what had happened. The same accounts say she left the set and locked herself inside her makeup room, and kept her conversation with the unit minimal afterwards.
Bhatt is reported to have spoken to Khanna privately afterward, asking the actor to explain himself and apologise to Kapadia. The source provides no direct statement from Khanna, Kapadia or Bhatt to confirm any of it.
Why a thin source matters
This is not a new disclosure from someone who was present. It is a revived citation of earlier media reports, removed from the moment by time and by attribution. For a publication of record, that distinction matters: the article tells us that the account continues to circulate, not that the events have been established. That is the difference between an allegation being repeated and an allegation being verified; the first can happen without any new evidence.
- The central claim rests on cited media accounts rather than on-the-record interviews.
- Prem Dharam also starred Hema Malini in a significant role, but it did not become a major blockbuster.
- The reported episode sits after Vinod Khanna returned to films following his association with Osho.
The film and the return
Prem Dharam is now remembered less for its box office than for the production stories attached to it. Khanna’s career had already followed an unusual arc: at the height of his stardom he stepped away from films to follow Rajneesh, known as Osho, before returning to acting.
That context shapes how the period is read. The Hindi film industry of that time operated with more informal set protocols, and what was tolerated or dismissed on a set can be difficult to reconstruct from a distance. The account is now seen through contemporary standards around consent and on-set conduct, which helps explain why it keeps reaching new audiences.
What a reader should hold on to
The report’s most important detail may be its limitation: it offers no direct confirmation from the people named. That does not erase the discomfort described, but it changes what a careful publication can responsibly assert. It also means an audience can hold two ideas at once: sympathy for the person who reported distress, and doubt about details that have not been confirmed.
Readers who encounter the story on social media should ask whether any named participant has spoken directly, and whether the version in front of them attributes the claim to an earlier outlet rather than to a new interview, legal filing or memoir. Until that changes, this remains a reported allegation with a long afterlife, not an established fact of production history.
Source: Moneycontrol
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