Raipur lawyer, whose phone was used to threaten Shah Rukh Khan, arrested

Mumbai: The Mumbai police on Thursday arrested Raipur-based lawyer Faizan Khan whose phone was used to allegedly threaten actor Shah Rukh Khan with physical harm if he did not pay the caller ₹50 lakh. The yet-to-be-identified caller had dialled the landline of the Bandra police station on November 5 to make the extortion call.
The lawyer was produced in a Raipur court, which granted his transit remand to the Mumbai police until November 15, allowing them to take the accused to Mumbai for further questioning. Faizan’s lawyer sought a medical examination for his client, which the court denied.
Faizan was arrested after he failed to appear before the Bandra police for questioning regarding the call. The police had traced the call to a number registered with Faizan and had dispatched a team to Raipur to question him.
The lawyer had told the Mumbai police that his phone had been stolen three days before the call and that he had, in fact, filed an FIR about the stolen phone with the Raipur police. While investigating whether his phone was indeed stolen, the police asked Faizan to come to the Bandra police station for further questioning, but he failed to appear.
According to the police, the man who made the threat call had said, “Woh Shah Rukh Mannat Bandstand wala hai na, usne agar mereko pachhas lakh nahi diye toh use maar daalunga (That Shah Rukh from Mannat, Bandstand, if he doesn’t pay me ₹50 lakh, I will kill him).”
When police constable Santosh Dhodke from the Bandra police station asked the caller his name and location, he said, “Woh matter nahi karta, likhna hai toh mera naam Hindustani likho (That doesn’t matter. If you want to write something, write my name as Hindustani).” The police had then registered a case against the caller under sections 308 (4) (extortion by threatening death) and 351 (3) (4) (criminal intimidation) of the Bhartiya Nyaya Sahinta.
The threat to Shah Rukh Khan follows a series of such phone calls targeting fellow actor Salman Khan, allegedly from the Lawrence Bishnoi gang. Talking to reporters in Raipur last week, Faizan had he had earlier complained to the Mumbai police against Shah Rukh Khan over a dialogue in his 1994 movie ‘Anjaam’ referring to deer hunting.
“I hail from Rajasthan. The Bishnoi community is my friend. It is in their religion to protect deer. So, if a Muslim says something like this about deer, it is condemnable. Therefore, I raised an objection,” he had said.