Businessman Raj Kundra Moves Bombay High Court For Quashing Of LOC In Pornographic Film Racket Case

A division bench of Justices Sarang Kotwal and Shriram Modak today ordered the Registry to list the matter before appropriate bench as per roster.

Kundra has moved the Court with a prayer to quash the LOC pending against him since 2021 stating that every time he travels outside India, he is required to undergo unwarranted hardship and scrutiny and has to spend long hours waiting at the office of the immigration.

In his plea through advocate Prashant Patil, Kundra has contended that he has travelled abroad for as many as 20 times after his arrest and subsequent bail and each time the lower court has permitted him to travel and he too has adhered to all the conditions imposed upon him.

"Despite court orders, every time there is a scrutiny and delay as the LOC, which was issued against him is still in force," the plea states.

The plea pointed out that Kundra was arrested while he was responding to the section 41 A notice issued to him under the CrPC and that he has been cooperating with the probe agency and has never absconded too.

"The petitioner has travelled to various countries under orders passed by the court and had not breached a single condition imposed by the court. It is a matter for record, investigation had started in 2021 and now four years have lapsed. Therefore, in my humble understanding, there is no need to keep this LOC alive against the petitioner as he has already been granted bail in the case. The LOC which was issued prior to my arrest continues to be enforced which violates my fundamental rights," the petition states.

Kundra along with other co-accused in the case, is booked under sections 354(C) (Voyeurism), 292 (sale of obscene content), 420(cheating) of the IPC and sectionsSections 67, 67A(transmission of sexually explicit material) of theIT Act and the Indecent Representation of Women (Prohibition) Act.

The Crime Branch investigating the case has contended that Kundra is a "key conspirator"in the racket, and they have found various foreign transaction of his company with the company uploading pornographic content from a foreign IP address in London. The police claimed that Kundra owned an app called 'Hotshot' that created pornographic content. Later the application was sold to UK based accused Pradeep Bakshi, allegedly Kundra's relative. However, Kundra still called the shots.

The police has said that the accused would lure struggling models and actresses. They added that accused model GehnaVasisth was the director of these porn videos and another arrested accused Umesh Kamat worked for Kundra.

They alleged that Kundra made a WhatApp group on which he would "monitor the revenue" of the App and give instructions to other accused on how to increase the revenue. The application was actually removed from Google play store, the prosecution said.