Mumbai:

A court in Mumbai has granted bail to actor Sahil Khan in the Mahadev betting app case. Additional sessions judge VM Pathade allowed his bail application on Wednesday, though the detailed order was not available yet.

Mr Khan, in his plea, claimed that most of the allegations against him were “speculative” and there was no concrete evidence.

The complaint filed against the actor was politically motivated, said the plea filed through advocate Faiz Merchant.

Not a single member or player using the Mahadev Online Book app – which is accused of facilitating online betting on a variety of games and activities – had filed a complaint against any of the accused named in the First Information Report, the application said.

The accused cooperated with the investigation since his arrest, it pointed out.

The actor was arrested from Jagdalpur in Chhattisgarh in April this year after the Bombay High Court rejected his pre-arrest bail plea.

Mr Khan, known for films like “Style” and “Excuse Me”, now works as a fitness expert.

A special investigation team is conducting a probe into alleged illegal transactions between certain financial and real estate firms and the promoters of the controversial app.

The size of the scam was about Rs 15,000 crore, as per the FIR registered by the Matunga police.

Police claimed in their reply to the bail plea that an investigation was underway against Sahil Khan and 31 other individuals.

The Enforcement Directorate is also investigating the money laundering aspect of the case.

(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

Mumbai:

A civil court in Mumbai on Friday rejected the interim plea of a 25-year-old woman seeking a DNA test on BJP’s Gorakhpur MP Ravi Kishan to prove her claim that the actor-politician is her biological father.

Shinova had filed a suit before a civil court here urging it to declare that she is the biological daughter of Kishan born out of his relationship with Aparna Soni.

The suit, filed through advocate Ashok Sarogi and Jay Yadav, as an interim measure had also sought DNA test to prove the woman’s claim that Kishan is her father.

However, the court on Friday refused to grant any interim relief. It then issued summons to the respondents, seeking their response on the main suit of the woman.

The matter will be next heard on July 23.

The woman, in her suit, said Soni came across various people belonging to the film fraternity, including Ravi Kishan, in her capacity as a journalist.

As per the plea, Soni and Kishan entered into a relationship and got married in 1991, though they could not reside together for long due to some personal problems.

Shinova, in the plea, said she was born on October 19, 1998, by which time it had come to light that Kishan was already married.

Considering these facts, it seems Kishan and Soni decided among themselves that their child would call the actor ‘uncle’, the plea said, adding that the duo took necessary care of her.

However, recently when Shinova and Soni visited the BJP leader to offer best wishes for the upcoming Lok Sabha polls, he misbehaved and refused to meet them, the plea alleged.

Following this, they held a press conference to tell the public about the rights of Shinova in her capacity as the biological daughter of Kishan, the plea said.

Nothing incriminating was mentioned in the press conference, despite which Kishan’s wife Shukla filed an FIR against them, Shinova said in the plea.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Mumbai:

A special court in Mumbai on Wednesday stayed the execution of a bailable warrant issued against BJP Lok Sabha MP Pragya Singh Thakur, an accused in the 2008 Malegaon blast case of Maharashtra after it was informed that she had taken ill and admitted to a hospital here for treatment.

The National Investigation Agency (NIA) court also noted that the warrant was not served on Thakur and directed her to appear before it on March 27 for a recording statement.

The court had on March 11 issued a bailable warrant of Rs 10,000 against the Lok Sabha member from Bhopal for failing to appear before it despite repeated warnings.

Special Judge A K Lahoti had then directed Thakur to appear before it on March 20 and get the warrant cancelled.

The Hindutva activist, however, did not appear before the court on the given date.

On Wednesday, Thakur’s advocate J P Mishra filed an application seeking a stay on the warrant issued against her.

He informed the judge that Thakur had come to Mumbai to attend the court hearing, but had to be admitted in a hospital as she fell ill after alighting at the city airport.

The judge, in his order, noted that the bailable warrant issued against the parliamentarian on March 11 was not yet served on her.

“Considering the reasons put forth in the application, the execution of the bailable warrant is hereby stayed till accused (Thakur) gets discharged from the hospital,” the court said.

The court has now directed the Lok Sabha MP to appear before it on March 27 for recording her final statement under provisions of section 313 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (dealing with power to examine accused).

A bailable warrant is a direction that if the person arrested executes a bail with sufficient sureties for attendance before the court, he/she may be released from custody.

Thakur and six others are facing trial in the more than 15-year-old case under provisions of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA), an anti-terror law, and the Indian Penal Code (IPC).

The NIA court trying the case is currently recording statements of the accused under the CrPC.

Six people were killed and more than 100 injured when an explosive device strapped on a motorcycle went off near a mosque in Malegaon, a town about 200 km from Mumbai in north Maharashtra, on September 29, 2008.

The Maharashtra Anti-Terrorism Squad initially probed the case before it was transferred to the NIA in 2011.