Monica Bedi taken to Bhopal

Hyderabad -- Film actress Monica Bedi, who was sentenced to five years' imprisonment in a fake passport case last month, was Thursday taken to Bhopal in connection with a similar case there.

Amid tight security, Bedi, escorted by a team of Bhopal police boarded the Delhi-bound Andhra Pradesh Express early Thursday.

Earlier, the police team armed with a prisoner transit warrant issued by a Bhopal court reached Chanchalguda women's jail to take custody of Bedi, girl friend of gangster Abu Salem.

Bedi is charged with obtaining a passport fraudulently from Regional Passport Office in Bhopal. She and Salem had obtained the passports in fictitious names of Fouzia Usman and Danish Baig. A case was booked at Koifiza police station in Bhopal in November 2001.

In December last year, she was taken to Bhopal for interrogation and was shifted back to Hyderabad jail.

Salem and Bedi were extradited from Portugal in November last year. While Salem is facing trial in Mumbai in connection with several cases pending against him, Bedi was brought here in connection with fake passport case.

A special Central Bureau of Investigation court on Sep 29 had sentenced her to five years' imprisonment.

Bedi along with Salem and his first wife Sameera Jamani had obtained passports under fictitious names from the Regional Passport Office, Hyderabad, in 2001. They had submitted false addresses of Kurnool town of Andhra Pradesh.