Actor Jacqueline Fernandez has been issued summons by Delhi’s Patiala House Court and directed to appear in court in connection with a ₹200-crore extortion case. The case is linked to conman Sukesh Chandrasekhar. The Enforcement Directorate has also named Jacqueline as an accused in it. The actor has been asked to appear in court on September 26.
As per news agency ANI, on Wednesday morning, the “Patiala House court took cognizance of the supplementary chargesheet filed in the case recently”, directing Jacqueline to appear before it next month. The case involves alleged extortion and money laundering by conman Sukesh Chandrasekhar. On August 17, the Enforcement Directorate named Jacqueline as an accused in it. The actor was rumoured to be in a relationship with the conman after pictures of the two surfaced online.
Earlier, the ED had alleged that Sukesh used money to purchase gifts for Jacqueline, which he had extorted by cheating high-profile people including former Fortis Healthcare promoter Shivinder Mohan Singh’s wife Aditi Singh. Jacqueline has been questioned multiple times by the agency in this case, the last being in June. The ED in April provisionally attached ₹7.27 crore funds of the actor under the PMLA apart from ₹15 lakh cash as the agency called these funds as “proceeds of crime”.
In her response to the court through her legal team, the actor maintained that her fixed deposits are from her own money and not from what was gifted to her by Sukesh. “The actor claimed that deposits are from the actor’s own legitimate sources of income and much before in time from even knowing that the main accused Sukesh even existed in this world,” the agency told media.
Earlier this month, Jacqueline’s lawyer Prashant Patil said she was a victim in the case and should not be treated as an accused. “You have to understand the humanitarian side of this. When any person is innocent, and if she is charged with a fake offence, it definitely is painful and not fair. Without hearing Jacqueline’s side of story, it’s not fair to prosecute her with such untrue allegations,” he told .
Though Jacqueline did share a cryptic social media post after being named an accused in the case, she has not commented on the matter in public yet. Her social media post from August 17 was addressed to ‘dear me’, and read ‘it’ll all be okay’.