Mumbai:
Actor Saif Ali Khan has been discharged from Mumbai’s Lilavati Hospital, six days after he was seriously injured in a knife attack during a burglary attempt at his Bandra home. The actor has left for his Bandra home, where heavy force has been deployed. Mr Khan, it is learnt, has been advised complete bed rest for a week and asked not to receive visitors to prevent any infection.
Heavy force has been deployed at the hospital as well as Mr Khan’s residence as people have started gathering at both places to catch a glimpse of the popular actor.
In an incident that shocked the nation and raised questions on Mumbai’s law and order situation, the actor suffered six stab injuries when a man who broke into his home attacked him with a knife. The actor, bleeding heavily from his wounds, was rushed to the hospital in an auto-rickshaw late on Wednesday night. One of the injuries was on his spine and doctors said the knife missed his spinal cord by just 2 mm. The spinal fluid, however, had leaked out and a surgery was conducted to fix this. The actor also underwent plastic surgery for injuries on his arm and neck.
Eliyama Philip, who looks for Saif Ali Khan’s sons Taimur and Jeh, has told police that she was the first to spot the intruder. She has said she was woken up by some noises around 2 am. She saw the bathroom door ajar and the light on and assumed that Kareena Kapoor Khan was checking on Jeh.
“… then I went back to sleep but, again, I realised something was wrong. So I woke up again and saw a man come out of the bathroom and go into the boy’s room. I quickly got up and went to Jeh’s room. The attacker then put his finger near his mouth and said ‘Don’t make any noise, nobody will go out’ in Hindi,” Ms Philip said.
“When I rushed to pick up Jeh, the man, armed with a wooden stick and a long Hexa blade. ran towards me and tried attacking me. I tried to block the attack by putting my hand forward, but the blade hit me near the wrists of both my hands and on the middle finger of my left hand. At that time, I asked him, ‘What do you want?’. He said, ‘I want money.’ I asked, ‘How much do you want?’ He said in English, ‘one crore’,” Ms Philip has said in her statement.
Hearing Ms Philip scream, Saif Ali Khan and Kareena Kapoor Khan rushed out of their room. When Mr Khan asked the intruder what he wanted, he attacked him with a wooden object and the hexa blade, Ms Philip said. “Saif Sir somehow managed to get away from him and we all ran out of the room and pulled the door of the room,” she said, adding that everyone then went to the upper floor of their home. The intruder later escaped, she said.
Police have arrested Shariful Islam Shehzad, a Bangladeshi national who illegally entered India and had been living under the false name Bijoy Das, for allegedly breaking into actor the actor’s home and attacking him. Earlier today, the accused was brought to Mr Khan’s Bandra residence to recreate the crime as part of the investigation.
