MUMBAI: Mumbai police have arrested Bollywood star Shilpa Shetty’s husband Raj Kundra for allegedly producing and broadcasting pornographic films online, six years after the businessman was banned from cricket-related activities over match-fixing charges.

Police announced Kundra’s arrest late on Monday, calling the 45-year-old “the key conspirator” in a case involving the creation and publication of adult films via internet apps.

“We have sufficient evidence regarding this,” police said in a press release, adding that investigations were ongoing.

The arrest is the latest scandal to hit Kundra, who has two children with Shetty, the 2007 winner of British reality show “Celebrity Big Brother”.

In 2015, Kundra was banned for life from all cricket-related activities, following an investigation into match-fixing during his stint as the co-owner with Shetty of the Rajasthan Royals, a franchise in the hugely successful Indian Premier League.

India has stringent laws against publishing and transmitting “obscene material”, but watching pornography in private is legal.

According to the adult site Pornhub, the nation of 1.3 billion was its third largest source of traffic in 2018, behind the United States and Britain.

In 2015, a government-appointed board of censors blocked the release of the erotic film “Fifty Shades of Grey” in cinemas, despite being shown a toned-down version, sparking claims of moral policing.

Published in Dawn, July 21st, 2021