The New Nation - Internet Edition

PTI, Panaji (Mumbai)

Bollywood actor Sanjay Dutt and his wife Manyata face double trouble with Goan authorities putting on hold their marriage registration process and a court in Mumbai ordering a probe into an undertrial's claim that she was still married to him.

Goa authorities have kept the registration process of Sanjay and Manyata's marriage earlier this month in abeyance after the mandatory residence certificate issued to Manyata was suspended by a Margao district official.

Adding to their discomfiture, Mehraj Shaikh, lodged in a Mumbai jail for allegedly sending vulgar SMSes and threatening Bollywood personalities with extortion demands, claimed before a court that Manyata was his wife and she had not obtained any divorce from him.

The Bandra magistrate court has asked the police to submit a report on the claim by February 20.

Forty eight-year-old Dutt and starlet Manyata, 36, tied the knot on February 7 in Goa and followed it up with a marriage as per Hindu rituals in Mumbai on February 11.

"All the marriage registration proceedings are kept in abeyance pending further orders," Goa Sub Registrar, Chandrakant Pissurlekar, who had accepted the declaration of marriage, told PTI. on the marriage, which has to be done within 90 days, till the Mamlatdar (senior administrative officer in district collectorate), clears off the suspension of the residence certificate.

Manyata had attached a residence certificate of a local panchayat, recommended by a talathi (revenue officer) in South Goa Collectorate.

The district administration has already suspended the officer for recommending the issuance of the residence certificate without verifying whether Manyata really stayed in the area for the last six months.

The marraige declaration of Sanjay and Manyata was submitted to the sub-registrar's office in Goa on February 7 within 90 days, the marriage would be "null and void".

The sub registrar also stated that Manyata will have to on the declaration.

"The decree has to be submitted before final declaration of marriage and till now she is yet to submit it," Pissurlekar said.

Shaikh had filed an application against Sanjay and Manyata in the Bandra court in Mumbai yesterday, alleging she has violated the Muslim marriage law by marrying Dutt.

He moved the application praying for legal action against Dutt and Manyata, stating that he had married Manyata on April 5, 2003 and has a son from her who is presently staying with the latter's mother.

According to Shaikh, they started living separately but had not sought talaq as yet.