Shilpa Shetty's husband and businessman Raj Kundra is all set to make his acting debut in the film UT69, which is based on a media trial and his life after he was arrested for a pornography case. The film shows Raj's jail time and the humiliation he went through and much.
Raj is busy promoting his film and also talking in-depth about his time in jail and sharing his and his family members' lives after he came out of jail.
Raj Kundra talks about his jail term, media trial and being called 'porn king'
In an interview with Pinkvilla, Raj Kundra said, "It is humiliating because wo nanga hi kar dete hain apko (They turn you naked). Checking if you are carrying any narcotics in your back side, they will strip you down in front of everyone so you feel like you have lost all your dignity when that happens."
"You feel like you have gone through so much already ab yahan pe bhi nanga kar rahe hain. Media to nanga kar hi rahi thi mujhe, upar se ye bhi ho gaya so I felt very disheartened and hurt (You feel like you have gone through so much already and now, here also they are stripping you. Media was already stripping me and now this happened, so I felt very disheartened and hurt)."
In an interview with E-Times, Raj opened up on why he made this film. He said, "I needed closure somewhere, there was something inside me that was bugging me. I wanted the world to see what I went through. Somewhere, I want people to see that there are lives which don't require to go through what they went through. The film is a story of emotions, bonding, the conditions they (inmates) lived in, the food they had etc. I was thinking of turning my notes into a memoir, which is when Shahnawaz Ali (director) told me not to. He mentioned that it has legs to stand on, we can make a movie on it. I found the idea interesting and planned to act on it."
While Raj Kundra was targeted by trolls it was his wife Shilpa Shetty who asked him not to take negative comments seriously. "Shilpa said, 'Don't complain, don't explain. Just go ahead. You know who you are and what you are. Forget these people," she told him.
He added, "You have to wear these sorts of blinkers. I was wearing a mask so it didn't bother me, but you have to wear blinkers and just go ahead with everything."
About Raj Kundra's case
Raj Kundra was arrested in an alleged pornography-related case in 2021. The trailer of the UT69 was dropped earlier this month.
Raj was granted bail after about two months in jail. He walked out of jail on September 21, a day after he was granted bail by the court. He was booked under sections of the Indian Penal Code, the Indecent Representation of Women (Prevention) Act and the Information Technology Act.