Khargone, Mar 12 (PTI) Monalisa Bhonsle, the young woman who shot to fame during the Prayagraj Kumbh Mela last year, has married a Muslim man in Kerala against the wishes of her family, her kin said in her native Khargone in Madhya Pradesh on Thursday.
Bhonsle, from Maheshwar town here and part of the nomadic Pardhi community, got married to Farman Khan on Wednesday at the Nainar Temple at Arumanoor in Poovar, her family members told reporters here, adding the two had come in contact through Facebook around six months ago.
“On March 2, some persons from Kerala came and told us they would help my daughter get work in films and train her in acting. I went with her to Kerala. But there she married one of them, Farman Khan. I opposed the move and asked her to return to Maheshwar, but she refused,” her father Jaysingh Bhonsle said.
Bhonsle said he had approached police in Kerala but was told that Monalisa was 18 years old, hence an adult, and was legally free to marry a person of her choice.
Her uncle Vijay Singh Bhonsle said Monalisa had turned 18 in January this year.
“Some people had lured her to Kerala on the pretext of acting opportunities. We are not very educated and do not understand how all this happened. Perhaps someone has influenced her. The family has little option but to accept her decision,” he said about the marriage.
“Whatever is written in her destiny will happen. We only hope that she succeeds in her career and progresses in life,” Vijay Singh added.
According to family members, Monalisa had earlier signed a film titled ‘The Diary of Manipur’ by filmmaker Sanoj Mishra and the money she received was spent on her travel, stay and training.
Her cousin Jai Bhonsle said Monalisa had once expressed a desire to open a school in her area.
After news of the marriage spread, reporters who visited her house in Maheshwar found the family reluctant to speak about the issue. Her grandmother Pramila said Monalisa had gone away for film-related work.
“If she wanted to marry, she could have told us. We would have arranged it,” Pramila asserted.
Mahendra Lodhi of Ujjain, who had been helping Monalisa with studies and acting training after her videos went viral, said he had spoken to her after receiving calls from family members.
“She told me that her family wanted to marry her off elsewhere while she had already chosen someone, so she decided to marry him,” Lodhi said. He claimed Monalisa had been staying on rent in Ujjain while receiving training from him and had also signed a Telugu film titled ‘Life’.
Maheshwar police station house officer Jagdish Goyal said the family had contacted him several times regarding her whereabouts.
“I was not aware she was in Kerala earlier. Later we contacted the concerned police station and obtained the location so that the family’s concerns could be addressed,” Goyal said.
Earlier in the day, addressing a press conference in Thiruvananthapuram in the southern state, Monalisa had said her wedding to a Muslim man was as per her choice and according to Hindu customs.
She rejected allegations that it was a case of ‘love-jihad’, a term used by right-wing groups to allege a conspiracy by Muslim men to lure Hindu women into relationships and marriage to convert them to Islam.
Bhonsle, eldest of four children, said her parents wanted her to marry her paternal aunt’s son, but she opposed the idea. She added her father was upset with her. PTI COR LAL BNM
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