Aditya Pancholi challenges conviction for assault

Mumbai: Bollywood actor Aditya Pancholi has filed an appeal against his conviction by a magistrate court in a case where he was convicted for assaulting his neighbour over issue of parking space.

An Andheri-based railway mobile court had, in November 2016, convicted and sentenced Pancholi to one-year simple imprisonment and had also imposed a fine of Rs 20,000 on him after holding him guilty of assaulting his neighbour on the dispute of car parking on the society premises. The court, however, on the same day accepting application of defence had granted bail to Pancholi on furnishing the fine amount for the period till filing of appeal to challenge the court order. Now the actor has filed the appeal against his conviction and sentence.

In the appeal filed by Ninad Muzumdar it is contended that the conviction is bad in law and the order of conviction is contrary to material on record and against the principles of natural justice. “The learned magistrate failed to appreciate the embellishments in the evidence which has come on record in the form of cross examinations,” read the appeal.

It is further stated in the appeal that the magistrate rather than appreciating the discrepancies in the right perspective and giving the benefit of the same to the accused (Pancholi) has appreciated the same against the accused by himself giving explanation of any such discrepancies.

The prosecution’s case is that in August 2005, Pratik Pasrani had gone to market and when he returned to his residential society, Magnum Opus Apartments, in suburban Versova in the evening he saw a car parked at the place allotted to him for parking his vehicle. However, the complainant parked his car behind the car already stationary there.

Later at around 8pm the watchman of the society called Pasrani on intercom and after a verbal argument, the complainant agreed to remove his car. The complainant has alleged that when he came down to take the car out, Pancholi allegedly started assaulting him. It is further alleged that Pancholi had also assaulted complainant’s father when he tried to intervene.