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Bombay HC dismisses Anita Advani’s plea to recognise relationship with Rajesh Khanna as ‘marriage’
The Bombay High Court also heard lawyers representing Rajesh Khanna's wife, Dimple Kapadia, daughter, Twinkle Khanna, and son-in-law, Akshay Kumar.
A single-judge bench of Justice Sharmila U Deshmukh dismissed the appeal filed by Advani against the 2017 order of the Dindoshi Civil Court in Mumbai. (File Photo)
The Bombay High Court Wednesday rejected a plea filed by actor Anita Advani seeking recognition of her relationship with late Bollywood actor Rajesh Khanna as a ‘marriage’.
A single-judge bench of Justice Sharmila U Deshmukh dismissed the appeal filed by Advani against the 2017 order of the Dindoshi Civil Court in Mumbai. The civil court had dismissed her suit, after which she approached the Bombay High Court.
Along with Advani, the HC also heard lawyers representing Khanna’s wife, Dimple Kapadia, daughter, Twinkle Khanna, and son-in-law, Akshay Kumar, and “dismissed the First Appeal”.
Advani was involved in several legal proceedings with Kapadia and others for nearly 14 years, including her claim that her relationship with Rajesh Khanna was a “marriage”. She had earlier lodged a domestic violence complaint against Kapadia, Twinkle Khanna, and Akshay Kumar.
On April 9, 2015, another bench of the High Court of Justice M L Tahaliyani (now retired) had set aside the domestic violence proceedings by observing that Advani had failed to show that her relationship with Rajesh Khanna was “in the nature of marriage”; therefore, she could not seek relief under the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005.
The HC, while allowing pleas by Kapadia, Twinkle Khanna, and Kumar against the criminal proceedings, observed that all the family members of the late actor could not be brought under the Domestic Violence (DV) law as Advani had not lived with them.
“It is an admitted position that the petitioners had never been staying in the shared household with Advani,” the HC had observed in 2015. It had added that “they never shared a common household”; therefore, the DV proceedings “could not have been filed against them only because they are relatives of the deceased Rajesh Khanna.”
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Advani had claimed that she was evicted from the late actor’s bungalow “Aashirwad” in Bandra (West), where she stayed with him till 2012 as his “wife” and had taken care of all his needs in good and bad times.”
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