Bollywood actor Shahrukh Khan found himself in a spot on Friday, a day after a social activist-cum-lawyer filed a complaint against him, his wife Gauri and five others in a city court for allegedly violating the legislation prohibiting sex selection before or after conception, during the birth of the couple’s third child AbRam through surrogacy.
In her complaint filed in the court of Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Uday Padwad on Thursday, activist-lawyer Varsha Deshpande alleged that the actor, his wife and five others had violated the provisions of the Pre-conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques (Prohibition of Sex Selection) (PCPNDT) Act.
Alluding to the child born to Shah Rukh and Gauri through surrogacy in a private hospital recently, Deshpande, an activist spearheading a campaign against female foeticide in Maharashtra, charged that the child’s gender had been determined before birth, in violation of the relevant sections of the Act.
Apart from Shah Rukh and his wife Gauri, Deshpande has named Mumbai Municipal Commissioner Sitaram Kunte, Executive Health Officer of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) Dr Arun Bamane, the IVF expert at Jaslok Hospital Dr Firuza Parikh, Jaslok Hospital directors, and the competent authority in the State Government in-charge of implementing the PCPNDT Act, as other respondents in her complaint.
Dr Parikh and Jaslok Hospital have already denied the allegations of handling Shah Rukh’s surrogacy case.
Having taken cognizance of the complaint filed in his court, Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Padwad has scheduled the case for verification on September 12, and issued notices to the couple and five others.
Meanwhile, talking to mediapersons at an Eid get-together that at his Bandra bungalow Mannat coinciding with the release of his latest film Chennai Express, Shah Rukh said on Friday that the allegations were a “part and parcel” of his being a celebrity and that he had left it to his lawyers to deal with the issue.
The actor, it may be recalled, had himself announced last month that he and wife Gauri were parents of a baby boy born with a surrogate.
“Amidst all the noise that has been going around, the sweetest is the one made by our new-born baby, AbRam. He was born prematurely by several months but has finally come home,” the 47-year-old Shah Rukh had said in a statement issued on July 9.