Sandalwood stars who sparkled behind bars

Darshan is not the first Sandalwood star to be cooling his heels behind bars. He is only the latest addition to the long list of jailbirds from Kannada filmdom.

The fame and shame of Sandalwood seems to be shining bright in jails, for more than ten stars have been involved in one or the other case since 2008. These cases range from murder to cheating and wife-beating.

It all started when Kannada actress, Maria Monica Susairaj of Joot fame, was arrested for the murder of Neeraj Grover and later acquitted. Later that year, realtor-turned-film producer, L Goverdhan Murthy, was arrested for the murder of actor Vinod Kumar in Kochi on October 11, 2008. He was booked under IPC 307 and the case is still on.

In July 2009, Raghu Kumar, producer of Meghave Meghave, was arrested for treasure hunting in Chitradurga. He was allegedly looking for treasure hidden in the caves of Chitradurga as his film Megave Meghave flopped miserably at box office. He had even hired a flight for the launch of his film and roped in Bollywood star Gracy Singh. All this drilled a hole in his pocket, leaving the producer looking for treasure.

Following this, in the same month, actor BP Srinivas was also arrested in cheating case by the Cubbon Park police. This chilli-powder vendor-turned-actor had even played a lead role in his film ‘Mussanjeya Gelathi’ with his daughter acting opposite him. He was allegedly caught for not paying off a debt he had taken for making the film. In the same year, producer Dinesh Gandhi was arrested in connection with a cheque-bounce case.

In wife-beating case, Darshan may still be a rookie with television anchor Anand being caught in a harassment case. Anand, who later joined the filmdom, was arrested by Basavanagudi women’s police for allegedly harassing his wife MS Bharani for dowry. Playback singer Hemanth was arrested on similar charges in September 2010.

Raghuveer, of Chaitrada Premanjali fame, and 14 others were arrested in December 2010 in Mysore, for allegedly running a brothel. Going a step ahead, a small-time actor, Yogesh, was arrested for murdering his wife in December 2010.

His wife, Manjula, was found murdered in their home and four goons were arrested in this connection. Later, Yogesh was also found guilty. He was alleged to have masterminded the murder as he doubted his wife’s fidelity.

The year 2011 saw more horrifying arrests, including that of Yamuna, who was allegedly caught for prostitution when Bangalore’s Special Task Force raided some five-star hotels in Bangalore and found Yamuna with Venugopal, a CEO of a software firm. In June this year, producer and distributor Bala Muthaiah was arrested in a cheque-bounce case at Sivakasi.

Actor-turned-director Harish Raj had allegedly sold the rights of his film to a Kannada channel without consulting the producer. He was locked up for cheating in May.