Joy arrested on charges of assaulting actor Sayantika

Kolkata: Police arrested Bengali television actor Sanjoy Mukherjee, popularly known as Joy, on charges of assaulting actress Sayantika Banerjee with whom the former had an affair for several years. He was granted bail by Alipore Court on Saturday.

The incident took place on Friday afternoon when the actress was returning home at Southern Avenue from the gym. According to the police, when her vehicle hit Southern Avenue, he overtook her car and blocked her way. He reportedly tried to force his way into her car and also damaged it. It was alleged that the accused had beaten up the actress' personal assistant who was accompanying her home as the latter tried to intervene. She lodged a complaint with Tollygunge police station on Friday evening on the basis of which the actor was arrested.

Mukherjee was arrested from his South Kolkata residence on Saturday morning. He has been booked for rash driving, wrongful restraint and voluntarily causing hurt under the Indian Penal Code (IPC) Sections 279, 341, 323. Banerjee alleged that the actor had physically assaulted her when she was returning from her gym at around 2 pm on Friday. She also said he had damaged her car. He was produced before the Alipore Court where he was granted bail. The actor termed the entire episode as a "personal dispute".

He said: "I had been trying to get in touch with her for quite some time to sort out certain issues but she was not responding. The matter was wrongly projected by them in the media. I don't want to talk about it." It was also learnt that both of them had paid a certain amount as an advance to book a flat. It was alleged that the actress was not paying the sum back to him after their break-up. Police have seized his car. Joy had worked with her in Target in 2010 and was reportedly her close friend.