Bass guitarist Mohini Dey has slammed link-up rumours with former collaborator AR Rahman. Last week, she announced her split with ex-husband, musician Mark Hartsuch, hours after Rahman shared a statement about parting ways with Saira Banu, his wife of 29 years. Following the simultaneous announcements, many social media users linked Dey, 28, and Rahman, 57, together.

Rubbishing the claims, Dey wrote on Instagram, “It is utterly unbelievable to see the amount of misinformation and baseless assumptions/claims against me & AR Rahman. Kindly stop with the false claims and respect our privacy (sic).”

In the clip, Dey said, “I have a lot of father figures, role models in my life, and I’ve been fortunate and grateful to have had them play vital roles in my upbringing. A R happens to be one of them. I respect him a lot. He is just like my father.”

In a bid to put an end to the ongoing speculations about her personal life, bass player Mohini Dey, who has been a part of music composer A R Rahman’s band, has called him a “father figure”. Taking to Instagram on Monday, she posted a brief clip in which she spoke about how she is the same age as Rahman’s daughter.

Quite a few eyebrows were raised when Dey took to social media to announce her separation from husband (saxophonist Mark Hartsuch) on the same day (November 20) as Rahman. Soon, rumours rose about her playing a role in Rahman’s separation from his wife of 29 years, Saira Banu.

In the Insta video, Dey said, “I have a lot of father figures, role models in my life, and I’ve been really fortunate and grateful to have had them play vital roles in my upbringing. A R happens to be one of them. By A R, I mean A R Rahman. I respect him a lot. He is just like my father. He is actually a little bit younger than my dad. His daughter is exactly my age, I think. We have a lot of respect and love for each other.”

Dey captioned her video thus: “It is utterly unbelievable to see the amount of misinformation and baseless assumptions/claims against me & @arrahman. It feels criminal that the media has vulgarised the two events. I honour my times as a kid working with @arrahman throughout my 8.5 years of working with him for his movies, tours, etc. It’s disheartening to see that people have no respect, sympathy or empathy towards emotional matters like this. It saddens me to see people’s state of mind...” HTC

Twenty-eight-year-old Dey developed an interest in playing the bass guitar right from childhood and has been performing on stage since the age of 11. During the eight-and-a-half years she spent as a member of Rahman’s band, she performed with him in over 40 shows worldwide. She has also performed alongside artistes like tabla exponent Ustad Zakir Hussain, percussionist Sivamani, American guitarist-songwriter Steve Vai, and German musician Marco Minnemann, among others.