Mumbai Mirror met up with Dimpy at Dadar on Thursday, just hours after she left Rahul’s house vowing never to return. There were bruises on her shin, right and left hand, while her left cheek was swollen. There was also a lump on her head.

Dimpy Ganguly (from left) shows a bruise on her leg and one on her arm; (right) with her cousin Dipankar Roy

Dimpy said Rahul beat her up early on Thursday morning after waking her up to know the contents of a message that had just beeped on her phone. Since the phone had the key-pad lock on, Rahul was unable to operate it.

When Dimpy asked him to let her sleep, he flew into a rage and began hitting her. She said he punched, kicked and dragged her by her hair.

When she could not take it any more, Dimpy pushed him, picked up her phone, ran down the stairs and hid in the passageway. This was 3.30 am. Dimpy then called a friend, who picked her up around 4 am.

Her father arrived at Rahul’s house at 4 pm after she related the incident to him over the phone. That’s when she returned to the house, packed her bags and left.

When contacted, Rahul denied he hit Dimpy. “It is not true at all. I just had dinner with Dimpy’s father,” he said.

Dimpy, who married Rahul on TV reality show Rahul Dulhaniya Le Jayega in March this year, had made desperate calls for help to her family and friends in the past couple of weeks.

A source said the abuse had started just a month after their national TV wedding. “However, the intensity increased in the past month-and-a-half,” he said.

Dimpy further said that the problems started after her insistence on appearing for her second year exam. Rahul was not happy with her trips to Kolkata for the same.

When he got angry, he would also get physical. “One such fight got so out of hand that I had to call my mother-in-law. Later he was angry that I had involved his mother in the affair,” Dimpy said.

She also alleged that during another fight, Rahul had pointed a gun at her. “He is a nice guy, but when he loses it, there is no telling what he might do.”

This is not the first time Rahul, son of late Bharatiya Janata Party leader Pramod Mahajan, has been accused of domestic violence.

Media reports had indicated his separation from his first wife, commercial pilot Shweta Singh, was because he used to hit her. The couple divorced in August 2008.

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“I really want him (Rahul) to pursue a political career,” Dimpy told reporters in Mumbai on Saturday night after exchanging wedding vows with Rahul on Imagine TV’s Rahul Dulhaniya Le Jayega.

To this, 35-year-old Rahul said: “I’ll first manage my home and once that is settled, I’ll manage the country.”

Rahul has earlier participated in reality show “Bigg Boss” too.

Dimpy, 21, is a model and actress by profession. She piped other finalists Nikunj Malik, 25 and Harpreet, 21, apart from over 16,500 applicants from across the country to be Rahul’s wife. And the Bengali lass says she will continue to work after marriage as well.

“Rahul doesn’t want me to be a housewife. So I’ll work. But I don’t know yet what I will be doing,” said Dimpy, who was sporting a red wedding outfit designed by Neeta Lulla, the traditional ‘mangal sutra’ in her neck and vermillion on her forehead.

Rahul had vowed to marry a girl on national TV and he kept his promise by doing so with the Kolkata-based girl, despite the recent death of his uncle Praveen Mahajan, who was convicted for killing his politician father Pramod Mahajan in 2006.

The duo will be registering their marriage on Tuesday in Bandra, Mumbai.

Rahul’s mother Rekha Mahajan was present during the lavish wedding and blessed the couple. His father’s photograph was also placed at the marriage venue.

Dimpy’s family members as well as several TV celebrities attended the glitzy event at the Leela Kempinski Hotel in Mumbai.

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Rakhi Ka Swayamvar proved to be lucky for the channel last year, garnering an average TVR of 2.8. In fact, the final episode garnered a TVR of 8.4 (C&S, 4+, HSM).

The question is whether NDTV Imagine will be second time lucky with Rahul Dulhaniya Le Jayega.

In its first avatar, Rakhi Ka Swayamvar engrossed the viewers for two reasons – first, it was a new format, so viewers were generally inquisitive; and second, Rakhi provided her own brand of entertainment. However, many viewers felt cheated, when the show did not culminate in marriage, but only in an engagement between the winner and Rakhi.

As Amit Ray, president and COO, Lintas Media Group, comments, “There was a lot of backlash post the show last year; it didn’t fulfil its major objective, ‘marriage’, and turned out as a joke. NDTV Imagine has experimented with newer formats, but again, people felt cheated in Season 1. Unless there is a twist in the content, this one will be a letdown too.”

This is why the channel, this time, has ensured that Mahajan keeps on saying, “It’s a Shaadi, not a Swayamvar”.

To establish the seriousness on Mahajan’s part, Nikhil Madhok, vice-president, marketing, communication and brand management, NDTV Imagine, claims that Mahajan has selected girls for the show with whom his horoscope has matched; and the grand finale of the show will be held on the day suggested by Mahajan’s astrologer.

However, other industry observers feel that the show could be watched for the entertainment quotient, irrespective of whether or not Mahajan gets married in the end. As Manas Mishra, head, Mudra Connext, opines, “Rakhi Ka Swayamvar made the channel’s share of television go up by 40 per cent last year. Just one programme delivered a huge dividend. But subsequently, it came down after the show went off-air. Swayamvar is a known concept and adding new things can only make it interesting. Rahul Mahajan earned popularity through Big Boss Season 2 and this show will take it further.”

Another media observer, Nikhil Rangnekar, executive director, West, Starcom India, suggests, “While Rakhi found favour with male audiences; with Rahul, things may be diametrically opposite. People might watch the show for the sake of format.”

A similar opinion is voiced by Pintoo Guha, the producer of Uttran on Colors. He says, “It’s not always necessary to intellectualise this medium of entertainment. At time the viewers would just like to sit back and enjoy the television.”

To reassert the expected success of the show, Madhok says, “This year, the registration for participating in the show has increased by 40 per cent.” While last year, the total registration was 12,515; this year, the figure has gone up to 16,755. However, one should also keep in the mind the eagerness that exists to participate in a reality show.

The channel has made room for Rahul Dulhaniya Le Jayega in the early primetime slot of 8-9 pm. For this, the show, Meera, which currently airs at 8 pm, will go off-air; and one of the channel’s more popular shows, Jyoti, will be shifted to the 7:30 pm slot.

As part of the promotional activities for the show, hoardings stating ‘Who is going to be Mrs Rahul Mahajan’ are seen all over the city. Another activity involves putting up special hoardings in localities such as Mahim, Bandra and Juhu. On this hoarding, Mahajan will be seen with a palanquin, in which the face cut-outs of the girls will be placed. The palanquin will unveil ‘on and off’.

Season 2 also claims to have grown bigger and better in terms of production and content freshness.

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