Amidst the dispute on Sunjay Kapur's Rs 30,000 estate after his demise, his widowed wife Priya Sachdev has now filed a defamation case against his sister Mandhira Kapur. The complaint, filed on Saturday, alleges that Mandhira repeatedly shared videos and posts across platforms such as YouTube, Instagram and X that explicitly named Priya and contained “false allegations designed to cause hatred, ridicule and social ostracism; thereby demolishing the reputation of the complainant..”, according to a Bar and Bench report.
The petition further claims that Mandhira, during a podcast appearance, suggested that Priya’s marriage to Sanjay was fraught and lacked legitimacy. After this case was filed on Saturday, Mandhira has now responded to these allegations. She said during an interview with HT City, “All of what I said is mentioned in court, how am I defaming? Anything I have lied about, let me know, because I can guarantee I’ve lied about nothing,” she asserted.
She also said she came to know about the defamation case only through social media and has not yet been formally notified. “The funny thing is the media got it before me! These are all tactics to distract me from what is going on,” she said.
The legal move comes amid an ongoing and bitter dispute between Priya and Sanjay Kapur’s family, including his mother Rani, his former wife Karisma Kapoor, and their children, over the ownership of an estate reportedly valued at Rs 30,000 crore.
Mandhira said her mother is deeply distressed by the situation. “I sit with my mother everyday, and she says ‘get everything back, your father (Surinder Kapoor) and I built this’ It’s horrible, what our family is going through. I am not going to go out there and lie to anybody about what the reality is. There’s nothing I can do if Priya is upset. I don’t blame her for being upset, but it is the truth. My mother, who built everything, today doesn’t have anything on her name. Imagine what she is going through.”
When asked why she did not speak out earlier, particularly before Sanjay’s death in 2025, and whether she might have personal motives, Mandhira remained unfazed. “Let them say what they want to,” she said, adding, “The fact is, all this belongs to my mother, my sister, to me, our children, my brother’s children. No one was trying to cut Priya out, she is the one who has done all this. No one was going to cut out of her bit of the family inheritance, but you don’t take it all and walk away. My father and mother never planned to give it to one child. We are going to fight for what is my mother’s first while she is alive. Everything was meant to be on her name, and that’s what my dad wanted.”
Mandhira also revealed that she remains closely connected with Karisma Kapoor and her children, Samaaira and Kiaan. “The kids have lost their best friend. My mother lost her son. It’s very tough. Everyone is going on about the money, but it’s also about my father’s legacy. The whole story that she (Priya) is doing about my father, that he ran down the company to the ground and my brother brought it up... no, the company was doing really well. Should I put a defamation against her now? You want to play this game? We can keep playing it. I have got nothing to lose.” Get the latest entertainment updates from the Times of India, along with the
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