Bangladeshi film star Shakib Khan, one of the country’s highest acclaimed actors, is being sued by an auto-rickshaw driver for using his business phone number on-screen in one of Khan’s recent films. The plaintiff claims that ever since the film launched, he has since been inundated with phone calls from the actor’s female fan base, which caused significant disruption to his life.
The film, Rajneeti, was released on June 25, 2017. During a scene with his onscreen love interest, Khan recites his character’s phone number. Although a common trope in Bangladeshi films, in this particular circumstance the number was not fake or made up. It was the real-life phone number of Ijajul Mia, an auto-rickshaw driver from the Jatrapasha village, in Baniachang Upazila, and the scene made the man’s life a living nightmare. A few weeks after the film’s release, the phone number had already been widely shared among Shakib Khan’s fans, and in a five day period in July Mia claims to have received over 500 calls from women seeking the popular actor.
