A Mumbai court has summoned actress Kangana Ranaut and her sister Rangoli Chandel, also the actress' manager, in defamation cases filed by actor Aditya Pancholi, news agencies reported on Tuesday. The next hearing is on July 26. According to PTI, two summons each have been issued against Ms Ranaut and Ms Chandel in four separate defamation cases filed by Mr Pancholi and his wife Zarina Wahab. The summons against Kangana Ranaut are based on interviews she gave in 2017; those against Rangoli Chandel are based on her tweets, news agencies report. Kangana Ranaut and Aditya Pancholi allegedly dated some years ago, after which she has accused him of assault.
"She (Kangana) had claimed that Aditya kept her under house arrest and she registered an FIR against him, but since no such FIR was ever registered, there is prima facie case that she defamed him," Mr Pancholi's lawyer Shreya Shrivastava told PTI. Rangoli Chandel allegedly tweeted about an FIR being filed against Aditya Pancholi in 2005-6.
The Kangana Ranaut-Aditya Pancholi feud has boiled over into the media; just weeks ago, Zarina Wahab defended her husband against the sexual assault allegations made by Ms Ranaut, telling Deccan Chronicle, , "I know him better than anyone else. He has never hidden anything from me. I know what has happened in the past. He has done no wrong."
Ms Wahab also told Deccan Chronicle, "You can't be in relationship with someone for years and then suddenly accuse him of rape just because the relationship has ended, or because the other person has moved on. It's just not right."
In a previous interview to Pinkvilla, Ms Wahab denied that Kangana Ranaut had reached out to her for help during the alleged assault.
Kangana Ranaut and Aditya Pancholi, who has been married Zarina Wahab since 1986, are believed to have dated for four-and-a-half years in the early 2000s when she was starting out in Bollywood. On Rajat Sharma's TV show Aap Ki Adalat many years later, Ms Ranaut accused Mr Pancholi of having beaten her up. She told NDTV in a 2016 interview, "When this man who used to be my father's age, he hit me so hard that my head was...I fell on my head on the floor and it started to bleed. I must have been 17 or something. I picked up my sandal and I hit his head hard and it started to bleed as well."
Kangana Ranaut is also locked in public battle with actor Hrithik Roshan, another supposed ex.
