Mumbai: Shilpa Shetty shown as a witness in Raj Kundra case chargesheet

MUMBAI: The city crime branch on Wednesday filed a 1,500-page supplementary chargesheet in connection with a pornography case in which Raj Kundra, businessman and actor Shilpa Shetty’s husband, and his company’s IT head Ryan Thorpe were arrested in July.
Shetty has been shown as one of the 43 witnesses in the supplementary chargesheet. There are five star witnesses in the case who have deposed before a magistrate and given statements against the accused.Shetty, though, has not said anything against Kundra that could help the prosecution, said officials.
Officials said this supplementary chargesheet is against Kundra and Thorpe.
Kundra’s brother-in-law Pradeep Bakshi and one Yash Thakur have been shown as absconding accused in the chargesheet.
Police said in the supplementary chargesheet they have attached details of email exchanges and WhatsApp chats between Kundra and the other accused, 24 hard disks containing pornographic material seized from Kundra’s office, Andheri bank details of Kundra’s firms and Hotshot app.
The crime branch press release stated Kundra and Thorpe in connivance with the other arrested accused took advantage of struggling aspiring models to indulge in obscene and pornographic acts.
Kundra’s name had surfaced in July after the crime branch’s property cell probing the case stumbled upon the involvement of UK-based production company Kenrin and arrested its executive Umesh Kamat in the case.
Kamat, a former employee of Kundra, is accused of uploading at least seven to eight “porn and obscene” videos allegedly shot by Gehana Vasisth on a social media app for monetary consideration. Police suspect Kundra has a stake in Kenrin and was involved in the production and distribution of pornography material.
In February, the property cell had raided a bungalow in Madh Island, Malad, and busted a porn video film-making racket and rescued a woman.