Ismail Darbar may be in the eye of a storm but the veteran music-maker behind evergreen film melodies in Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam and Devdas is unperturbed. "Controversies have always been my middle name, " says the music maker. "But when it comes on your izzat, you cannot sit quietly and take things lying down. "

Ismail Darbar refers to the story in a tabloid where they accused him of being responsible for Sa Re Ga Ma contestant Poonam Yadav's supposed pregnancy, abortion and a suicide attempt that followed.

Incidentally, the journalist spoke to Ismail Darbar when he was performing his mother's last rites, and called him a pretender and went ahead and printed the story based on a phone call without even bothering to contact Poonam or her mother.

Poonam Yadav is angry at her character assassination by the tabloid and fiery when she stands by Ismail Darbar refuting the baseless accusation.

"Ismail Darbar and Ayesha Darbar (Ismail's wife) have been my pillar of strength and support. I am from a very poor family and they gave me money, bought my clothes and treated me like one of their own children.

Every Id and Diwali, I would get clothes like their kids and when I had no money, they would take care. If I wanted to eat something, Ayesha would prepare the dish for me.

The last few months, I was so stuck with financial trouble that I did not see it right contacting my mentors as I did not want the call to be mistaken as a call for help.

I have to stand on my own now and make my future and not trouble Ismail or Ayesha Darbar with my problems. It was one day when I was upset and tired after spending sleepless nights on my financial troubles when, I took an overdose of sleeping pills to sleep, not realising the severity of it.

I woke up two days later at the hospital to see Sir's name being dragged into an alleged controversy not even an alphabet of which was true. Couldn't the so-called journalists have waited for two days for me to regain consciousness? At least they could have talked to my doctor if not me!"

Yadav is sure she neither had nor has any intention to die. "It is people who write things like this that should worry about suicide, not me.

I was depressed due to poor financial conditions and the fact that my house fell in land which would be taken away by the government when I had just spent a lot to make it pucca, This is a lot for a girl like me who has to shoulder a lot of burden from childhood.

It is appalling that the junta gets to read untruths from two senseless so-called journalists who misused their pen to malign my character.

Didn't the women, Bharati Dubey or Ashwini Deshmukh of Mumbai Mirror even think twice about penning such cheap things about my mentor and me? If not as tabloid journalists, as least as women, they should have thought twice. "

Says Darbar, "she said once on the show that her father died when she was still in her mother's womb. I told her in the show that day that I am your father from today. I will see that you achieve your dreams.

I don't make statements in the air. I say what I feel, " says Ismail Darbar who is known to never mince words.

Darbar is angry at journalists who resort to cheap yellow journalism to sell tabloids. "It is quality that makes you sell. Not cheapness, " says Darbar who has sued the paper for Rs 25 crore.

"I am a respectable man, a father of five children. I have three teenaged kids who have to face the world. My sisters are getting questions from their in-laws. Why? Who is responsible for this? And what right do people have to accuse and write on people without proof?

Even if they did write without investigating properly, post my notice and the realisation that the news was false the paper should have clarified and restored my dignity, and they failed to do so.

What score did they have to settle? Since they did not think twice before tarnishing my image, I will stop at nothing now, " thunders Darbar who unlike his fiery self, kept mum till the time he found out that Poonam had no affair or abortion and the sleeping pill overdose was done in a fit of depression.

"They accused that I had an affair, was responsible for her abortion, that I got her a flat in Mumbai, went with her to Varanasi... what not!

So much muck thrown at my reputation without even an ounce of truth! How dare they? Still, in this case, it was a matter of a girl's life, her izzat.

I had promised I would take care of her life, her future as her deceased father would have. And my anger and usual fiery self would not have helped her. I did not know if she really had an affair with some local boy and had an abortion and did that trauma make her take a drastic step to try and end her life.

Those questions could only be answered by Poonam, and no one else. Only she could clear my name as I was completely innocent.

My entire family prayed for her, and I asked my wife to call and enquire the truth post her coming into her senses. When she revealed that in her life, there was neither and affair or an abortion, I decided to go ahead and say what I was suppressing all along.

If this girl had died, I would have had to spend my entire life telling people I was framed. At least today, she came out thanks to Allah, and is speaking out, " storms Darbar who feels that even if he weren't Ismail Darbar the personality, he would still stand up for what is right.

"Zulm sehna bhi utna hi gunaah hai jitna ki karna, " he says. "I will make sure I get justice and so does Poonam. We are people not pawns.