A metropolitan magistrate court in Mumbai in its recent order has held that tennis legend Leander Paes committed various acts of domestic violence against his former partner Rhea Pillai.
The court has thus ordered the tennis star to pay monthly maintenance to his ex live-in girlfriend on certain conditions.
Case:
Model-actor Rhea Pillai was born to Raymond Pillai and Dhurreshwar Dhanrajgir, a doctor, and the daughter of Maharaj Narsingir Dhanrajgir Gyan Bahadur of Hyderabad and actress Zubeida, who acted in the first Indian film Alam Ara (1931).
Rhea was earlier married to a US National named Michael Vaz from 1984 to 1994. Later, after divorce with her first husband, she married Bollywood star Sanjay Dutt in 1998, but the duo soon separated and never had any child. However, the official divorce between Pillai and Dutt only came through in the year 2008.
Even before her second official divorce, Pillai started dating tennis ace Leander Paes in early 2000s and while this couple never got married to each other, they had a daughter Aiyana in 2005 out of wedlock.
Pillai then filed a domestic violence case against Leander Paes and his father at a Mumbai Metropolitan Court in 2014. Rhea had approached court saying that she was in a live-in relationship, akin to marriage, with Leander Paes for eight years.
Mumbai Court
The court in 2022 has directed Leander Paes to pay monthly rent of Rs 50,000 apart from monthly maintenance of Rs 1 lakh to Rhea Pillai if she chooses to leave their shared residence.
Metropolitan magistrate Komalsing Rajput had passed the order earlier this month, which was made available on Wednesday.
She had claimed that Leander Paes, through his acts and conduct “caused verbal, emotional and economic abuse, which resulted in tremendous emotional violence and trauma”.
The magistrate, in her order, said,
It is proved that the respondent caused various acts of domestic violence.
Directing Leander Paes to pay monthly rent and maintenance, the court, however, added that if she chooses to continue living in their shared residence (at Bandra), she will not be entitled to monetary relief.
The magistrate said that with Leander Paes’ career in tennis ‘almost over’, it would cause ‘serious prejudice’ to order him to live in a rented home while also paying maintenance to Rhea Pillai.
Excerpts from The Telegraph 2008 (Alimony to Rhea Pillai by Sanjay Dutt) (Click Here)
Today, when it tumbles out that former model Rhea Pillai used her star-husband for a life of comfort, the squeaky clean, spiritual image loses some of its sheen. Details of Sanjay Dutt’s alimony settlement before he got his official divorce from Rhea (which came through only this February) were scooped last week by Mumbai tabloid Mid-day, and soon Rhea’s image was demolished.
Forget the three-bedroom sea-facing apartment and a Honda, the fact is that Rhea had moved on to another man, tennis ace Leander Paes, quite a long time ago (before Manyata came into Sanju’s life) and had a baby with him but, right until her divorce in February, she merrily had the actor foot all her shopping and mobile bills. Sanjay Dutt did the right legal thing by supporting her till the divorce was official. But what moral right did she have to his money when, as she claims, she had moved on in life?
Imagine sending whopping mobile and credit card bills (which included shopping in America for Leander’s baby) to your husband simply because he is vulnerable enough to pay up!
What is worse is that Rhea Pillai reacted to that tabloid story with viciousness, doing what she really shouldn’t have — blamed Sanjay Dutt’s current wife, Manyata, for leaking out details of the settlement.
The truth is, when the tabloid contacted her for her statement before publishing the settlement details, Rhea had self-righteously declined to comment. So when the story was published why did she go running to a rival paper to vent her spleen on Manya who was not mentioned as the source by the tabloid? Simply because the la-di-dah image had got a bashing? What is to be noted is that Rhea could only try to pull down Wife No. 3, she could not refute any substantial part of the tabloid story.
Apart from showing Rhea as materialistic, in this celebrity-studded episode, the father of her daughter, Leander too, does not come off smelling of roses. After all, what kind of man allows his ‘wife’ to bill her ex-husband simply because an official divorce is still to come through?
Forget about the morality, the whole sordid affair throws up one pertinent legal question too: if the divorce came through only in February (and therefore Dutt had to bear all of Rhea’s expenses until then), and people have been talking about the legality of Sanjay’s marriage(s) to Manyata, how about the Rhea-Leander wedding? What is the legal status of that marriage where there is a child to boot? Now that the teflon coating has been rubbed off, these are uncomfortable queries that must be making the ‘classy’ Rhea Pillai/Dutt /Paes squirm uncharacteristically.
Leave Your Comments On This Court Verdict Below:
Mumbai Court Orders @Leander To Pay Monthly Maintenance To Former Live-in Partner Rhea Pillai
— Men’s Day Out (@MensDayOutIndia) February 27, 2022
▪️Alimony Details From 2nd Husband @duttsanjay
▪️Apart from 3BHK Sea Facing Apartment, Car, Dutt was footing her bills till divorce while she had baby with Paeshttps://t.co/jvMYIr73U8
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ALSO WATCH –
Karan Thapar Interview (2006) With WCD Minister Renuka Choudhary (Domestic Violence Act)
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