Kangana Ranaut's Passport Renewal : Bombay High Court Refuses Javed Akhtar's Intervention

In a related development, author Ashish Kaul has filed an application in the Bombay High Court accusing Actor Kangana Ranaut of "lying under oath" by concealing lyricist Javed Akhtar's defamation case against her to obtain a favourable order, renew her passport and travel abroad.

Kaul has sought an investigation against Ranaut by the passport authorities for "false representation" and action under section 10 of the Contempt of Courts Act. He has also asked for Kangana to surrender her passport or for it to be impounded by the police.

The author filed the application in Ranaut's plea to quash the FIR in the Didda Copyright Row, which is based on Kaul's private complaint.

On June 28, the Bombay High Court had disposed of two applications by Ranaut seeking directions to renew her passport after the Passport Authority said they would consider her application expeditiously based on Kangana's counsel's assurance that no criminal cases were pending against her and only 2 FIRs were registered.

The first FIR registered with Bandra Police Station is based on casting director Munnawar Ali's complaint against Ranaut and her sister Rangoli Chandel, for promoting enmity, sedition, and trying to create a communal divide through their social media.

The second FIR is by Kaul, author of a book on Kashmir's warrior queen Didda after Kangana announced that she would be making a sequel to the 2019 film, tilted Manikarnika: The Legend of Didda.

Kangana's lawyer made a statement before the court that those were the only cases pending against her, following which the court directed the Passport authorities to consider the plea for renewal of passport and eventually, her passport was renewed.

Kaul, in his fresh plea, however, says, that Kangana deliberately hid the information about the defamation case filed by lyricist Javed Akhtar, which was revealed before the court by Akhtar himself in an intervention application.

"This turned out to be a complete lie after Mr. Javed Akhtar brought on record that the petitioner Kangana Ranaut is an under trial in case number 2575/SS/2020 at the Metropolitan Magistrate's 10^th Court at Andheri where she is released on conditional bail. Further, not a single court has granted any relief to Kangana Ranaut till date. Further, this is an unequivocal lie by the petitioner and not a contradiction of any kind," Kaul's contempt petition reads.

"This lie is not a normal lie as this lie was accompanied by documents filed under oath at the Hon'ble High Court of Judicature at Mumbai. Further, this lying under oath was then followed by further lies to the Passport Office by the petitioner Kangana Ranaut, which then led to her being issued a passport without any sanctions as it may be a case with other undertrials who possibly face strict sanctions including but not exclusive to being given passports for extremely limited periods such as 12 months and so on and so forth. The intent of the lie was also very clear as it was not a spur of the moment statement but a proper procedure of filling in the application, further filing a Writ Petition as well as Interim application and then submitting false statements to acquire a favourable order," the plea further alleges.

On Monday, the bench also asked Ranaut to approach a single-judge bench in her plea challenging the defamation proceedings initiated on Akhtar's complainant, after Grover raised an objection during the hearing. Grover said that according to the Bombay High Court Appellate Side Rules, the matter would go before a single judge.