Monica clears last hurdle, release soon

The Supreme Court on Monday ordered the release of former Bollywood actress Monica Bedi from a Hyderabad jail after she agreed to the cancellation of her passport, Satya Prakash.

The Supreme Court on Monday ordered the release of former Bollywood actress Monica Bedi from a Hyderabad jail after she agreed to the cancellation of her passport, which she was supposed to surrender as a condition for her bail.

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Bedi, who was extradited along with mafia don Abu Salem from Lisbon in Portugal in 2005, had said that she was not in possession of the passport issued to her by the Regional Passport Office, Mumbai in 1999 and therefore could not surrender it as directed by the court. A bench headed by Chief Justice K.G. Balakrishnan asked RPO, Mumbai to cancel her passport and asked the CBI court in Hyderabad to release her on bail on fulfilling the other bail conditions. Bedi faced trial in Hyderabad and Bhopal for allegedly possessing forged passports.

CBI had chargesheeted her for procuring a passport from Hyderabad on forged documents in the name of Sana Malik. The Madhya Pradesh police have also registered a case against her for getting a passport on the basis of forged documents in the name of Fauzia. She was sentenced to three-year imprisonment in the Hyderabad case, while the Bhopal Court recently acquitted her.

The SC had in May last granted her bail in the Hyderabad case. The High Court had reduced the five-years imprisonment awarded by the trial court to three years.