22 years after Abbas-Mustan’s blockbuster film Aitraaz released, its central theme of gender, power and workplace harassment eerily resurfaced in a massive controversy involving former JPMorgan Chase employee Chirayu Rana and company senior executive Lorna Hajdini.
The case has stark similarities to the plot of Aitraaz, yet is far more complex than the film’s clear moral arc starring Akshay Kumar, Priyanka Chopra and Kareena Kapoor Khan.
According to a report by the New York Post, Rana, 35, alleged in a lawsuit filed this week that Hajdini, 37, sexually abused him. He also claimed that she drugged him with Rohypnol and Viagra and threatened to cut his bonus if he did not comply.
However, in a dramatic turn of events, the multinational bank’s internal investigation – based on phone records and emails – reportedly found no evidence supporting those claims. The New York Post report also noted that Hajdini was not in Rana’s direct reporting line, raising questions over his allegation that she could influence his compensation.
The parallels with Aitraaz largely emerge from its gender-reversed premise. In the film, Akshay Kumar’s character, Raj, is summoned to his superior’s home, where Sonia (played by Priyanka Chopra) makes advances that he rejects.
One of the film’s most talked-about moments unfolds in this sequence, when Sonia attempts to seduce, and at the same time, coerce him with the line, “Show me you are an animal”.
She later accuses him of sexual harassment and attempted rape, leading to his professional and personal downfall before the truth is eventually exposed in court.
The backstory adds another layer to the conflict. Raj and Sonia share a past relationship, and she is now married to his boss, placing her in a position of power and influence over his career. When Raj refuses to rekindle the affair, the allegation triggers a chain of events that forces his resignation and public humiliation.
The narrative then shifts to the courtroom, where his wife Priya (played by Kareena Kapoor) takes up his defence, eventually exposing Sonia’s motives and manipulation and establishing the accusation as false – giving the film a clear, decisive resolution that real-world cases rarely offer.
But beyond this broad similarity, the comparison between the film and the real-life JPMorgan case begins to fray. Unlike the film, which arrives at a clear conclusion, the JPMorgan case remains contested, with sharply opposing versions and no legal determination so far.
Chirayu Rana, a former JPMorgan employee, also alleged racial harassment, claiming Hajdini referred to him as “my little brown boy” while making sexual innuendos, according to reports and social media discussions.
Hajdini denied all allegations. In a statement to the New York Post through her lawyers, she said: “Lorna categorically denies the allegations. She never engaged in any inappropriate conduct with this individual of any kind and has never even been to the location where the alleged sexual assault supposedly took place.”
In his complaint, Rana said the alleged misconduct began soon after he joined JPMorgan’s leveraged finance team in spring 2024. He reportedly filed an internal complaint in May 2025, alleging race-and gender-based harassment and abuse of power, and later attempted to negotiate a multi-million-dollar payout to exit the firm.
The lawsuit also names JPMorgan Chase as a defendant, accusing the bank of retaliation and of failing to conduct a proper investigation – claims the company has denied in full.
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