A Mumbai court on Thursday granted bail to Ukrainian actor Armen Ataian, who was arrested last year for allegedly getting a forged birth certificate to claim Indian citizenship. The court said his status as a foreign national alone cannot be a reason to refuse him relief.
Court orders release on Rs 25,000 bond
According to the PTI report, Additional Sessions Judge Satyanarayan R Navander ordered Ataian’s release on a personal recognisance (PR) bond of Rs 25,000, with one or two sureties of the same amount. The court said his further custody was not needed for the investigation.It observed, “However, the mere fact that the applicant is a foreign national cannot, by itself, be a ground to deny him bail.” The actor has also been told not to leave India without prior permission from the court.The judge said the remaining verification of official records linked to the document can be done without keeping Ataian in jail. He added that the questions on whether the birth certificate is genuine and whether the actor was born in India need proper examination during the trial.
Case against the actor
According to the prosecution, the Bhoiwada police in Mumbai registered a First Information Report (FIR) against Ataian on February 14, 2025, under Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) sections related to cheating, forgery and criminal conspiracy. He has been in custody since February 19, 2025.
Arguments by both sides
Advocate Akram Kapoor, appearing for the actor, said Ataian was born in Mumbai in 1976, when his parents lived in the city between 1975 and 1978. He argued that the actor had lived in India for several years, had no intention to cheat anyone and no longer needed to be questioned in custody.Special Public Prosecutor Taralgatti opposed the bail plea. He said that although Ataian holds a Ukrainian passport, he tried to get documents to prove Indian citizenship under suspicious circumstances. The prosecution added that the genuineness of the certificate and his actual place of birth were still being probed.
What the court noted
After going through the chargesheet, the court noted that witness statements and other material collected during the probe support the claim that Ataian’s parents lived in Mumbai from 1975 to 1978 and that he may have been born there. However, it pointed out that official records are yet to be fully verified.The court held, “Having regard to the nature of the allegations and the material already collected during the investigation, his further custodial detention does not appear to be necessary for the purpose of investigation.”To address the prosecution’s fear that the actor could leave the country, the court directed him to deposit his original passport with the investigating officer before his release from jail.