Actress Rubina Ali at her home on March 3, 2009 in Mumbai, India. (Photo by Ritam Banerjee/Getty Images)
BBC News has reported that the father of Slumdog Millionaire child actress Rubina Ali denied that he is trying to sell the 9-year-old actress.
Rafiq Qureshi, father of Rubina said that he did not accept the deal to sell the young star into adoption.
A report published by News of the World said that Qureshi is demanding for $300,000 from the undercover reporter posing for a wealthy Arab sheik that wanted to adopt Rubina. (Read related story)
Qureshi said that the media made fun of their poverty.
“They tricked us into this fakery but we came out unscathed,” said Qureshi, who works as a carpenter in Mumbai.
In an interview with BBC News, Qureshi said that “he had been trapped into a situation of ‘great temptation’ but he firmly denied accepting any deal to sell his daughter or agree for her to be adopted.” (Check out the full BBC interview with Rafiq Qureshi on the BBC News website.)
Police are now investigating the allegations that Qureshi tried to sell her daughter for $300,000. Although he denied the allegations, he has been arrested and quizzed for several hours by police in Mumbai, amid claims from Rubina’s mother Khurshida that she knew about the sale two weeks ago.
Khurshida, who abandoned the family in 2001, says, “My elder daughter had informed me… I did not believe he would actually go through with it.”
A police spokesperson tells British newspaper The Sun, “Khurshida was very upset by the media reports and she came to lodge a complaint. We are registering her grievance and then we’ll investigate and decide what further steps should be taken in the matter.
“When we questioned Rubina she said she does not want to go anywhere and wants to live with her father.”
Meanwhile, Slumdog Millionaire producer Christian Colson has revealed movie bosses are attempting to intervene in the scandal.
He says, “Our friends and colleagues in Mumbai are trying to speak with Mr Qureshi to get to the bottom of what happened.”
