Shilpa Shetty stopped at airport, alleges harassment

Sep 26, 2007, 19:14 GMT

Mumbai, Sep 26 (IANS) Actor Shilpa Shetty faced some unpleasant and embarrassing moments at the international airport here early Wednesday when an immigration official allegedly spoke rudely to her just before she was to leave for Germany for West End musical 'Miss Bollywood'.

The immigration officials at the Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport were apparently not informed of the Supreme Court clearance given to the Bollywood actor to travel abroad.

Her spokesperson Dale Bhagwagar said: 'The immigration authorities at the Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport just seemed to refuse to take note of this clearance of Shilpa's name by the Supreme Court.'

'She called me in the middle of the night and was in tears saying an inspector had treated her badly, and told her she could not travel out of the country as there was no clearance order from the court,' Bhagwagar said.

'I can understand something like this if I'd committed a criminal offence. But what was my offence, when I'm just an actor, going to perform a musical on foreign land, representing my country? I don't need to be treated like this in my own country. It's terrible,' said Shilpa before she left.

The actor had kicked off a controversy a few months ago when Hollywood star Richard Gere kissed her in public at an AIDS awareness event in New Delhi. The incident triggered protests from some, and some people filed cases against her in various courts of the country. When the Supreme Court gave a direction to transfer the cases to the Mumbai court, most of the complainants backed out.

However, a court in Alwar district of Rajasthan issued a 'look-out notice' for Shilpa at various airports. The notice said that the actress shouldn't be allowed to leave the country till the Richard Gere-Shilpa Shetty case was over. Shilpa appealed to the Supreme Court against this order, and the apex court quashed the Alwar court order and gave her permission to travel abroad.

What added to the actor's embarrassment was a huge crowd that had gathered around at the airport to watch her exchange of words with the immigration personnel.

Now Shilpa is planning to take action against the immigration authorities for what she termed as offensive behaviour.

© 2007 Indo-Asian News Service