Farhan Akhtar's production house accused of non-payment of around Rs 25 lakh to daily-wage workers!

New Delhi: Farhan Akhtar and Ritesh Sidhwani's Excel Entertainment landed in legal trouble. Film Studios Setting & Allied Mazdoor Union (FSSAMU) publicly accused them of non-payment of dues to 300 of their daily-wage workers.

FSSAMU claimed that the production house has outstanding dues of Rs 20-25 lakh, they did not pay the daily wagers who worked in the production design team of 'Mirzapur 3' from May 2022 and still the workers have continued the work. However, Excel Entertainment has denied the accusation. The union has also released a letter to the media accusing the production house of non-payment. 

According to a report in Mid-Day, the letter states that the workers were made to work for extended hours and not paid. Also, the workers were not provided with quality food and seating arrangements. 

Farhan and Riteish's production house did not give any response to the letters until after the letter to the media was released. Now, they have contacted them and promised to settle the dues in the next 48 hours.

According to Mid-Day, the statement issued by Excel Entertainment reads, "This is the first time we are being made aware about such a complaint raised by the union. We would like to further [state] that the FSSAMU has not reached out to Excel through letters, e-mails, or phone calls. Excel currently has seven to eight projects under production, and none of these projects have any non-payment-related issues. For the past 22 years of us being in the business, we have never come across any non-payment complaints."

They further added, "Excel has a strict payment compliance policy whereby we directly make payments to daily-wage workers and not to any union. We will investigate this matter from our end. We would like to mention that Excel enjoys a stellar reputation in the industry for treating all collaborators with equal respect and dignity."