Mumbai-based actress Chrisann Pereira, who was framed in a drugs case and lodged in Sharjah central jail, was on Wednesday released from prison by UAE authorities and is expected to return to India in the next 48 hours. This development came a day after the Mumbai Police arrested two accused - Anthony Paul and Rajesh Bobate alias Ravi - who framed her with drugs in a fit of rage.
Chrisann was jailed after she was found carrying drugs hidden in an award trophy.
Paul (35), a bakery owner of Borivali, and his associate, a banker Ravi are in police custody till May 2.
Her distraught family in Mumbai said that 27-year-old Chrisann was lodged in Sharjah jail since April 1 and sought an early release from the UAE prison. “We are appealing to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Minister for External Affairs for their intervention in the matter to secure the release of our daughter…After the Mumbai Police investigation, it is clear that she was framed in the whole thing," her mother Premila Pereira told the news agency IANS.
Both accused have confessed to handing three persons the award trophies with drugs concealed in them and two others with drugs-laced cakes before they flew to Dubai, ostensibly as vendetta against the Pereira family. While two, including Chrisann, unwittingly walked into the trap, three others managed to evade the authorities in Sharjah.
The accused, identifying himself as a talent consultant, had approached Premila Pereira in March-end, to lure Chrisann with an audition for a role in an international web-series in Sharjah. He also persuaded the actress to carry the trophy in which he had hidden the drugs to be handed over to an associate in Sharjah who would give details of her hotel booking.
After reaching Sharjah, Chrisann found that nobody came to receive her at the airport, but the local police landed, detected the drugs in the trophy and hauled her to the lockup, and later the Sharjah Central Prison from April 1.
Paul, said to be the brain behind the revenge con, apparently nursed an old grudge against the Pereira family, especially Premila (the mother), and even got into fisticuffs with her son Kevin.
Police have found that the accused Paul had used the same modus operandi with some other wannabe actors, assuring them of plum roles in global web-series, though one person declined to carry the trophy, which Chrisann later agreed to take with her.
The Mumbai Police does not suspect a drug syndicate involvement but only Paul’s “revenge tactics" against all the victims with whom he had some or other problems, but they are investigating from various angles.
An upcoming actress, Chrisann has played roles in films like “Sadak 2", “Batla House", web-series “Thinkistan", several stage plays, and lives in Borivali suburb with her family.
(with inputs from IANS)
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