By Mata Press Service

Citing that he needs to continue his father’s charitable work in Canada, quintessential Bollywood bad boy Sanjay Dutt, is pleading with an Indian court for leniency after being found guilty of weapons offences.

The offences are related to a series of bomb blasts in Mumbai in 1993 that killed 257 people and maimed hundreds more.

Dutt, 47, faces a prison term of up to 10 years following his conviction late last month under the Arms Act for illegally possessing a 9mm pistol and an AK-56 rifle.

He told Judge P.D. Kode that he was the sole breadwinner for his family and that he has taken up the charity work for the Nargis Dutt Cancer Foundation, set up 23 years ago after the death of his actress mother.

“My father had started a cancer foundation. He is no more, so I have taken over the services. We raise money, procure equipment and help patients.” Speaking about the Nargis Dutt Foundation, he said that it is basically in America, Canada and Europe. Equipment purchased there is brought to India to help cancer patients. If he undergoes punishment for long, this work would stop.

“I also raise funds for Tsunami victims. I have given a cheque on behalf of the film industry for those affected by Tsunami. I love my country, the people of my country. I would request the honourable court to please show mercy and be lenient,” Dutt pleaded.

“I have a young daughter aged 18 studying in New York and I am supporting her as her grandparents are old. Her future depends on me,” said the actor who has been cleared by the same court of charges of terrorism and conspiracy.

He is likely to be sentenced early next year.

The Nargis Dutt Cancer Foundation was formed in 1981 in New York and now has some 20 chapters worldwide including Vancouver and Toronto. The non-profit chapters function independently with a volunteer board and have raised over five million dollars.

The Vancouver chapter chaired by Manjit Johal is among the most active having collected hundreds of thousands of dollars for mobile hospitals and cancer detection equipment.

The equipment, including mobile hospitals, is operated by Indian hospitals and medical personnel. The Nargis Dutt Cancer Foundation now has four mobile hospitals running in the Bombay slums, Gujarat, Jaipur and Jalandhar. Much of the money was raised by Dutt’s father Sunil, a well loved actor turned politicians, whose last visit to Vancouver was November 2004. He died earlier this year.

In the summer of 2004, Sanjay Dutt left Canada in a huff after an article in The Asian Pacific Post about the charges which was followed up by the Calgary Herald, Canadian Press, national radio and TV.

Dutt was shooting the movie Dus in Calgary and felt the mainstream media reports had wrongly accused him of being a terrorist. He swore never to return to Canada.

He described reporting the fact that he has been charged in India under the terrorism act in connection with the 1993 Bombay blasts that killed hundreds of people and maimed hundreds more as “defamation”.

The Calgary Herald which was the first to pick up The Asian Pacific Post story, front paged their article with the headline - ‘Bollywood terror suspect in India stars in movie shooting in Calgary: Ottawa grants entry permit’. The story was an accurate portrayal of a sequence of events that ranged from Dutt being a Bollywood superstar, the charges against him, the movie shoot in Canada, an Indian court giving him permission to travel, his denial, etc. It triggered howls of protest in Calgary’s Indo-Canadian community.

After leaving Calgary in a huff, Dutt was quoted in Los Angeles as saying the following about the Calgary Herald article: “It was a long half-page article ripping my reputation into bits. I’ve never been more hurt in my life. I’m consulting lawyers over here to see how best to tackle this situation. Yes, I’ve decided to sue the Calgary Herald for defamation. Enough is enough. Don’t you think I’ve taken enough crap”

The suit was never filed.The hulky, droopy-eyed screen hero, Bollywood experts say, was often pushed to the brink as he found it difficult to handle the pressures of being the son of one of India’s superstar couples -- Bollywood actors Sunil Dutt, a Hindu, and mother Nargis, a Muslim. A former drug addict, he has led a troubled and well-publicized private life, but his fans have stood by him.

His problems started early in life as he is known to have taken to drugs while still in high school. When his mother died shortly before the release of his first film as a lead actor in 1981, his addiction apparently worsened. “He was close to his mother and her death left him devastated,” said a Bollywood director close to Dutt. The tall, muscular actor returned to films after a stint at a rehabilitation center in the United States where he met his future wife, Richa Sharma.

The couple married and had a child, but Dutt’s happiness remained short-lived as Sharma died of a brain tumor. More misfortune awaited Dutt as he lost custody of his daughter after a bitter legal wrangle with his in-laws. But just when he seemed to be putting it all behind him and came up with a hit film, he was linked to the 1993 bombings and jailed during investigations. Released from jail, Dutt remarried, but the couple divorced in 2005, the same year his father, a federal minister, died of a heart attack.

In a country where the combination of pedigree and clout often leads to a bending of the rules, the actor -- known as “Deadly Dutt” for his macho image and portrayal of gangsters and the anti-hero -- has truly been a controversy’s child.

In 2001, he was investigated for alleged money-laundering deals between the Mumbai underworld and Bollywood. He was also alleged to have been caught in a taped conversation with gangsters accused of kidnapping, extortion and murder.

But uncannily, he has retained popular support and sympathy from Bollywood as most see him as a sober, good-hearted man whose troublesome youth refuses to leave him. “His spirit is invincible,” said Sanjay Gupta, filmmaker and a friend of Dutt. “He has seen the worst and dealt with it.” Actor Sunil Shetty told The Times of India newspaper that the past 13 years had been “like a prison sentence without bars” for Dutt. Shetty said Dutt was a generous human being, who had paid for the operations of Bollywood workers and financially supported many families, charitable work that the movie industry aims to publicize. The guilty verdict has also spurred the Bollywood movie industry to speak out on behalf of Dutt.

For the first time in the history of Bollywood, all 22 associations that make up the Hindi film industry will come together on 12 December, 2006 at Film City for a signature campaign in a show of support for actor Sanjay Dutt.

The campaign, in support of the beleagured actor will emphasise that Dutt is ‘not bad as he’s made out to be’, and may result in a day long shutdown of all of Bollywood’s activities.

“I will definitely be there and so will members of my association. Sanjay is a part of our film industry and he is not a terrorist. We are not against the verdict, but we just want to make a plea that he shouldn’t be given a strict sentence. I don’t know if the entire film industry will be shut down,” says Indian Motion Pictures Producers Association (IMPAA) president T P Aggarwal.

Dutt has reportedly asked the industry not to go ahead with the campaign.