New Delhi, August 20
Going public for the first time on her estranged relation with businessman husband Sanjay Kapur, Bollywood actress Karisma Kapoor today in a sworn statement before the Delhi High Court accused him of “deserting” her.
In an affidavit, filed in reply to the court notice on Sanjay Kapur’s petition challenging Karisma’s efforts to take their four-month-old daughter, Samaira to the US without his consent, the actress alleged that the case was a “crude attempt” by her “disgruntled” husband to use the child as a “pawn” after she was forced to leave his house in January.
Sanjay had earlier moved the High Court seeking to restrain Karisma from taking Samaira to the US and also challenged issuance of passport to the child on the actress’s Mumbai address.
He had contended that the address on the passport was illegal as the girl’s real
address was that of Delhi. While accusing Sanjay of suppressing a vital fact from the court that he was a US citizen, Karisma in the affidavit said he had “constructively deserted” her and was fully aware why she was living in Mumbai.Seeking dismissal of her husband’s petition on the passport issue, Karisma said, “The contours of the petition left no doubt that it is a crude attempt to urge and seek
redressing of matrimonial issues of a disgruntled husband and this respondent (Karisma) by using the minor as a pawn.”
Narrating the sequence of events that forced her to leave Sanjay’s home in Delhi, the actress said she had no option but to live at Mumbai separately from him in such circumstances.
She claimed that except for very few visits to see their daughter, Sanjay had played no part in the upbringing and welfare of the minor after she was born in Mumbai.
Karisma also accused her husband of not giving any financial support to the child after her birth or taking any “pre-natal” care of the mother.
The actress also raised the jurisdiction issue for entertaining the petition by the High Court, saying the passport to the child was issued by the Regional Passport Officer (RPO), Mumbai, by following the due procedure of law and the dispute, if any, pertaining to it could only be raised in the Bombay High Court.
She alleged that Sanjay Kapur was a US citizen and this fact was “suppressed” by him from the court while filing the petition.
On the contrary she was a citizen of India and “has deep roots in Indian society,” the affidavit said adding that the actress had no intention whatsoever to settle in the US or any other country and the passport to the child was valid under law.
Karisma said her child had a fundamental right to travel abroad along with the mother and it could not be curtailed as it would amount to infringement of her right to liberty.
