Bollywood Superstar Salman Khan was recently convicted for killing two endangered blackbucks in the 1998 Jodhpur poaching case and has been sentenced to 5 years in Jail but has been granted bail. While he may be the poster boy of incarcerated Bollywood stars, he is by far not the only one. Bollywood has a laundry list of stars who have found themselves on the wrong side of the law. Corporate Citizen lists some notable Bollywood Celebrities who have broken the Law.
The director who’s famous for his movies with female protagonists like Chandni Bar, Satta, Page 3 and Traffic Signal, was arrested for allegedly raping an aspiring actress. When no conclusive evidence turned up, the courts found him not guilty and let him go.
The son of Bollywood actorcouple Aditya Pancholi and Zarina Wahab is embroiled in a case of abetment of suicide of British-American actress Jiah Khan, who was found dead at home in June 2013. The matter is still in the courts. Sooraj made his debut in 2015 in Hero, but the movie bombed and so did his career.
Saif had another brush with the law in 2012 when he was accused of punching a businessmen during a dinner outing at a five-star hotel in Mumbai. He was booked for assault under section 325 of the IPC and was arrested, only to be released on bail.
The original Bad Boy of Bollywood Sanjay Dutt was held guilty for his involvement in the 1993 Mumbai bombings that killed 257 people in Mumbai. The Supreme Court sentenced him to five years in jail in 2013 for illegal weapons possession under Section 15 of TADA. He was arrested on 19 April 1993, for possession and destruction of an AK-56 rifle, which was a part of a cache of arms and explosives that had landed in India prior to the blasts of March 1993. On 31 July 2007, a TADA court in Mumbai sentenced him to six years' rigorous imprisonment under the Arms Act and imposed a fine of Rs.25,000 on him. He has since paid his dues to society after spending 42 months in the Yerawada jail in Pune and being released in 2016.
In what was front page news at the time, Bollywood actor Fardeen Khan was arrested by the Mumbai police for drug possession in 2001. He was caught red-handed for buying cocaine from a drug dealer. Fortunately for him, his clean record came to his rescue, after which he underwent a detoxification course. In 2012, the actor was granted bail with immunity in the drug case.
90s actor Monica Bedi spent almost two years in jail when she was arrested along with underworld don Abu Salem on a fake passport case after they were extradited from Portugal. She was later released from a Hyderabad jail in 2007.
Shiney Ahuja was on his way to becoming the next big thing in Bollywood with his brooding persona in films such as Hazaaron Khwaishein Aisi and Gangster but his career went south when his domestic help accused him of rape in 2009. The media went into a frenzy as the very much in-demand actor was arrested and tried for the heinous crime. She later retracted her charge but the trial court judge refused to accept it and convicted Ahuja based on circumstantial evidence. A fast track court sentenced him to seven years of rigorous imprisonment in 2011. His appeal is pending in the Bombay High Court. However, the case spelled an end to his Bollywood career.
Heartthrob John Abraham, who otherwise boasts of an impeccable public image, has also had a brush with the law. In 2006, he had injured two people with his speeding bike. Finding him guilty, the Bandra Court had pronounced a 15-day jail sentence against him. But the Bombay High Court gave him bail. The case has since been scrapped.
By Neeraj Varty
