How Jacqueline Fernandez landed in a conman's mess

Jacqueline Fernandez has been named as an accused in the Rs 215 crore extortion case. The Enforcement Directorate has said that it believes that Jacqueline Fernandez was a beneficiary of the extortion money. It also said that the actress was aware that Sukesh Chandrashekar was a conman and an extortionist. 

The actress who has been named as an accused has two big-budget movies lined up, including Ram Setu with Akshay Kumar and Nushrratt Bharuccha, and Rohit Shetty's Cirkus, along with Ranveer Singh, Varun Sharma and Pooja Hegde. 

The actress came in contact with the conman after he tried to get in touch with her several times. Seeing that she did not respond, Chandrashekar contacted her make-up artist and pretended to be an officer from Union Home Minister Amit Shah’s office called Shekhar Ratna Vela, and the owner of Sun TV, and the nephew of Jayalalitha. 

They hit it off after the duo came in contact. Chandrashekar showered her with gifts of around Rs 10 crore, including Birkin bags, clothes from Chanel, Gucci, YSL, a bangle from Hermes and a bracelet from Tiffany’s, and four cats, watches from Rolex, Roger Dubuis, Frank Muller, and a brand-new Mini Cooper. He also loaned $180,000 to her sister and $50,000 to her brother. 

Sukesh also claimed that he gifted her mother a Porsche, and her parents a Maserati, but she denied this. 

Sukesh’s modus operandi is to identify a wealthy victim and extort them of money. But things went south when he got in touch with former Ranbaxy promoter Shivinder Singh’s wife Aditi Singh, pretending to be a government officer, and convincing her that he can help her get her husband out of prison. Singh has been in prison for siphoning of funds. 

He pretended to be various government officials, and after the first few calls asked her to contribute to the party fund. He manages to extract crores of rupees from her in the first few months. Aditi Singh kept paying in the hope that he would help her get her husband out of prison. The ED believes that she paid him money to the tune of Rs 200 crore. 

Since the revelation of the case, the actress has been summoned multiple times by the ED. Actress Nora Fatehi was also summoned by the agency. 

Fernandez was also stopped by the immigration authorities at the Mumbai airport, acting on a Look Out Circular (LoC) issued by the ED against her. Agency sleuths later reached the airport and asked her to remain in the country as the probe was underway. She was supposed to take a flight to Muscat, Oman. 

The ED eventually attached assets worth Rs 7.27 crore of the actress in the extortion case under the anti-money laundering law.

Also read: Jacqueline Fernandez lands in trouble; ED names her as accused in Rs 215 crore extortion case

Also read: ED attaches assets worth Rs 7.27 cr of Jacqueline Fernandez in extortion case