Some contestants of the reality show in Calcutta on Sunday. Picture by Sanjay Chattopadhyaya

Midnapore/Calcutta, Aug. 10: The Midnapore hotel employee who dropped down four floors on Friday night was “extremely critical” today, but the arrested TV producers and reality-show contestant continued to insist that Prasun Adhikary was never pushed.

The trio, however, have changed their earlier version about Adhikary, 27, falling off the roof while trying to escape down a pipe after being caught harassing girl contestants in their hotel rooms, police claimed.

“They are now saying Adhikary fell accidentally during a scuffle. But they still insist he had harassed the girls,” said an officer who had questioned producers Gautam Jain and Rajiv Mehra and contestant Somnath Roy Chowdhury, part of the Lux Fatafati Filmy Fight or F3 unit who had checked into various Midnapore hotels for a shoot.

Two of the show’s contestants, a boy and a girl who were at Ritz Bengal where the incident happened, backed the harassment charge and said Adhikary was drunk as well. But other hotel staff dismissed both allegations.

They stuck to the claim that the TV unit members threw Adhikary off the roof after the kitchen supervisor had objected to their drunken party on the terrace.

“The nature of the head injuries suggests he fell headlong, which could result from a push,” a police officer said. He said urine tests on the accused showed no trace of alcohol “but the samples were taken after 12 hours”.

In Calcutta, contestant Satabdi Chakraborty, 21, said Adhikary had knocked on the girls’ doors around 2am. “One of us opened the door; the man was drunk and abusive. We called some of the male contestants from the second floor.”

Fellow contestant Sumanta Ghosh said: “By the time we reached the third floor, where the 18 girls were staying, the man was in his room on the terrace. He came out and abused the girls. We called the producers. When they threatened him he tried to escape by jumping off the terrace.”

Sumanta added: “Hotel staff and neighbourhood people attacked us with empty beer bottles and botis. They beat us up badly.”

Hotel employee Swapan Bera said Adhikary never drank and was a man of “gentle” temperament. His colleague Bhagirathi Das said the TV unit members were angry with Adhikary because he had earlier refused to bring them alcohol. “He never knocked on the girls’ doors.”

A doctor at Calcutta’s SSKM Hospital, where Adhikary is admitted with head injuries and multiple brain haemorrhage, said: “He is running a high temperature and has respiratory problems. He is yet to regain consciousness.”

The patient’s younger brother Palash, a software professional who works in Salt Lake, said the doctors were not holding out much hope.