The actor, along with three friends, has been accused of forcibly whisking away Maruti Gowda outside an event hall on Saturday night and assaulting him in a moving car.
Kannada actor Duniya Vijay arrested for assaulting gym trainer
Bengaluru - 24 Sep 2018 11:00 IST
IANS
Kannada cine star Vijay and his three friends were arrested in Bengaluru on charge of assaulting a gym trainer, police said on Sunday (23 September).
"We have taken Vijaya (44) and his three friends into custody on a complaint by the victim's relative Kitti for questioning though there are conflicting reports about the crime and its reasons," assistant police commissioner (west) Ravi Shankar said.
A metropolitan court remanded the accused in 14-day judicial custody till 6 October after the police produced them before its judge at his residence in the city.
"The accused have been lodged in the city central jail, as they have been remanded to judicial custody for investigating the assault charge," Shankar said.
According to the complaint, the accused forcibly whisked away gym trainer Maruti Gowda outside an event hall on Saturday (22 September) night and assaulted him in a moving car before freeing him after police warned the actor.
"The accused and the victim went to watch a bodybuilding event at the Ambedkar Bhavan in the city centre on Saturday night and quarrelled over some issue. They forcibly pushed Gowda into a car and drove away and thrashed him for over an hour while driving around the city," said Katti in the complaint.
Denying the assault, Vijay told the police that it was his fans who attacked the latter for abusing him during the fracas at the hall.
"We will investigate the case after recording the statement of the victim, admitted at a private hospital with bruises," Shankar added.
The actor shot to fame when his fans began calling him 'Duniya' Vijay after his Kannada film Duniya (2007) became a blockbuster.
Some of Vijay's other films like Chanda (2007), Junglee (2009), Johny Mera Naam Preethi Mera Kaam (2011) and Jayammana Maga (2013) have also turned into box office hits since then.
According to international magazine Forbes latest list of wealthy Indians in the celluloid world, Vijay's net worth is $21 million (Rs151 crore, approximately).
"Vijay is on bail after he was arrested in another case on 8 June on charge of obstructing police from investigating an accidental death of two stunt actors by drowning during a film shoot in a city lake in November 2016, in which he was the hero," a police officer said.
