Shilpa Shetty and Raj Kundra’s Thailand trip blocked as Bombay HC refuses interim relief on LOC plea

The Bombay High Court on Wednesday declined to grant interim relief to actor Shilpa Shetty and her husband Raj Kundra, who had sought permission to travel abroad. The couple had requested suspension of a Look Out Circular (LOC) issued against them in a cheating case worth Rs 60 crore.

Shetty and Kundra had approached the court with an interim plea to travel to Phuket in the first week of October for a family holiday, citing confirmed bookings. However, the division bench of Chief Justice Shree Chandrashekhar and Justice Gautam A Ankhad asked the state to file its response to the plea by October 8.

The application also detailed further travel plans, including a work trip to Los Angeles later this month, followed by visits to Maldives and Colombo for the expansion of their hospitality venture, Hotel Bastian. They also sought permission to visit London and Dubai later in December to meet Kundra’s parents.

Representing the applicants, advocates Niranjan Mundargi and Keral Mehta argued that Kundra had cooperated with the investigation and appeared before the Economic Offences Wing (EOW) last month after being summoned. The lawyers further claimed the couple had previously travelled abroad even after another case was filed in 2021 and had returned without breaching conditions.

Despite this, the bench directed public prosecutor Mankunwar Deshmukh to submit the state’s reply within a week. The court said it would hear the matter on October 8 but refused relief for overseas travel during the first week of October.

The LOC was issued in connection with a complaint filed by Deepak Kothari, director of Lotus Capital Financial Services Ltd. According to the FIR, Kundra and Shetty allegedly approached him in 2015 through a loan agent, seeking financial assistance for Best Deal TV Pvt Ltd, their then home shopping platform.

Kothari alleged the couple persuaded him to route Rs 60.4 crore as “investment” instead of a loan, assuring monthly returns. However, the complaint stated that repeated recovery attempts failed, with the couple attributing delays to the pandemic. Kothari eventually accused them of using the funds for personal benefit.