The Bombay High Court on Friday has ordered the Mumbai police to submit a confidential report on whether a Bhojpuri film actress residing in Mumbai requires police protection. The actress has been involved in a legal battle with her ex-husband.
She told a bench of Justices Revati Mohite Dere and Prithviraj Chavan on Friday that she had been threatened.
The bench was hearing a petition filed by the actress’s husband seeking to quash the FIR registered against him. The actress’s lawyer told the court that the estranged husband tortured her. He stated, “He was purifying her by burning a tattoo on her hand. He forbade her from practising her profession because it was a sin. She is also a Muslim like her husband, but she does not follow it.”
The actress’s lawyer also submitted that the man deceived her by claiming to be 50 years old when he was actually 80.
At this, the bench questioned her, “Did she not see him before marriage? Did she not know the man had two wives?” The lawyer responded, “She had seen him, but he looked younger, and he had only told her about one marriage. He didn’t mention his two wives, children, or grandchildren.”
The accused’s lawyer responded by stating that the man is paralysed and that the actress had previously married, divorced, and received Rs 1.5 crore in alimony. The lawyer alleged that the actress had filed a case against another man who she was in a relationship with.
However, the actress’s lawyer claimed that she never took alimony money from her husband and that the case against the other man was one of cheating because he promised marriage but ran away with money and jewellery. She stated that the allegations made by the ex-husband’s lawyer had nothing to do with the case against him, and that such defamatory statements cannot be made in an open court.
The bench told the man’s lawyer, “You told us that this was a quashing by consent. But, given the age difference, we suspected something was wrong, which is why we suspected she was being coerced, and now that she has said so, it appears you have made false consent terms.”
The court has asked the accused man to be present in court during the next hearing.
