According to news agency ANI, actress Kangana Ranaut was granted bail by a Mumbai court on Thursday in the defamation case lodged by writer and lyricist Javed Akhtar.
Ms. Ranaut appeared in court and requested that the bailable warrant issued against her be revoked. She has previously applied for and been granted bail by the judge.
Mr Akhtar had filed a criminal defamation lawsuit against Ms Ranaut after the actress gave an interview to a news channel last year in which she mentioned a meeting with the lyricist in 2016.
Following the death of actor Sushant Singh Rajput in June last year, Mr Akhtar said that Kangana Ranaut made defamatory remarks about him in an interview, dragging his name when referring to a “coterie” in Bollywood.
Ms. Ranaut and her sister Rangoli Chandel had gone to the Supreme Court earlier this month, requesting that cases pending against them in Mumbai be transferred to a court in Shimla, claiming that their lives would be jeopardized if the trial took place there due to “personal vendetta” by Shiv Sena leaders against them.
The actress received a bailable warrant on March 1 after failing to respond to the summons issued by the judge.
“Issue a bailable warrant of $1,000 against accused Kangana Ranaut for the willful absence of accused (Ranaut) without any justifiable reasons, despite service of summons,” Magistrate R R Khan said in the order.
“Since the accused (Ranaut) has willingly remained absent without any justification pending service of the summons and has not submitted any exemption application, issuance of a bailable warrant for $1,000 against accused would be justified under the statute,” it said.
She appeared in court on Thursday, after which the judge granted her bail.
In a related development, the Karnataka high court on Thursday dismissed an FIR filed against Kangana Ranaut after she likened protesting farmers to terrorists in a series of tweets.
