At the Germany airport the actress was accosted by the immigration authorities and detained in an isolated room for at least half an hour.
<s_shubha@dnaindia.net>
Tuesday night, Shilpa Shetty encountered airport problems again — she was off to Germany with her troupe of dancers and choreographers, about fifty of them, to perform for her musical ‘Miss Bollywood’ which unveils in Berlin on September 29.
However, at the airport, she was accosted by the immigration authorities and detained in an isolated room for at least half an hour while the rest of her team were allowed to go.
Apparently the infamous Richard Gere kiss case is still pending a notice (a look-out notice, generally issued in criminal cases and served at exit points of the country) issued by a court in Rajasthan, disallowing her from flying out of the country.
But soon after, the Supreme Court had stepped in and given her the required permission to fly anywhere she wants to. But apparently the notice hasn’t reached the airports as yet and officials were not sure if she should be allowed to fly out of the country at all.
Shilpa was not carrying the relief note with her. After a gruelling interrogation lasting about 30 minutes, she was finally allowed to go.
Understandably, both Shilpa and her mother Sunanda were fuming after the incident. Earlier in June too, when Shilpa was flying to the UK, the same problem had cropped up and she was made to go through a similar gruelling session by immigration officials.
“She called me in the middle of the night and was in tears as an Inspector by the name of Mr P Deshmukh had treated her badly, who gruffly told her she could not travel out of the country as there was no clearance order from the court,” said her publicist Dale Bhagwagar.
“This is not the sole incident. In the last few months, every time Shilpa travels out of the country, immigration authorities hassle her. So much so that one would think they get some kind of sadistic pleasure in doing so,” he added.
“Is she expected to carry a copy of the Supreme Court order all her life? Will the authorities take decades to note the court development?” Bhagwagar asks.
Says Shilpa, “I know that they (immigration personnel) were doing their duty, but there is certain decorum to be maintained, even when one is doing his duty. I can understand something like this if I’d committed a criminal offence.
But what was my offence? I’m an actor, going to perform a musical in a foreign land, representing my country. I don’t need to be treated like this in my own country! It’s terrible! It’s shocking!,” she added.
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