In a recent tete-a-tete with 'Stardust' magazine, when Shilpa Shetty's publicist Dale Bhagwagar claimed that her new mobile number rests only with her core team of six to eight people, little did he know that just after a fortnight, he would have to eat his words.
Last week, a fan of the actress, leaked her personal cell number on the internet via a mass mail circulated to his friends. "Shilpa is in UK at the moment and extremely perturbed that her mobile number has suddenly fallen in the hands of hundreds of people. We have no clue how this person got hold of it, but such mischief is damaging and Shilpa is not the kind of person to take it lying down. We will be taking up the matter with the concerned authorities dealing with such white-collar offences," said Bhagwagar.
The mail, with Shilpa's number grafted on a picture of hers, is spreading like wildfire on the net, and is being forwarded amongst friend circles in India and abroad.
"Shilpa is being harrowed with hundreds of calls and SMS's from all kinds of people. Some want to date her, some want to just listen to her voice, some want to inquire if her musical 'Miss Bollywood' is doing fine and some call just to check if they are speaking to the real Shilpa Shetty," he added.
This unfortunate leak has happened at a time when Shilpa had just begun to enjoy the success of her musical abroad. After two initial days of technical hiccups, 'Miss Bollywood' rocked Germany for three weeks and her tour across the country got her a lot of accolades. Now in UK, Shilpa is stunning her countless loyal fans with shows of her musical happening almost on a daily basis in various cities. "So much is the enthusiasm and frenzy that the producers are planning to squeeze in two extra shows than planned, for next week. At such a time of joy, this leak of her personal number is quite a dampener," states Bhagwagar.
On behalf of Shilpa, Bhagwagar will be filing a complaint at the Cyber Crime Department of the Crime Branch at Crawford Market in Mumbai at today asking them to trace the culprit who recklessly spread her number on the internet and take him to task.
