Friday, December 2 2005 10:30 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

New Delhi: Monica Bedi's family yesterday (Dec 01, 2005) pitched in support of their daughter's claim that she had never married underworld don Abu Salem saying their 'innocent child' had been 'misled' by the gangster.

"Monica is an innocent child and was misled by Salem. She never knew Salem's true identity until she moved to Dubai. She had never married Salem and was trapped," sources quoted her father Prem Bedi and mother Shakuntala as saying.

"We are calling her home, because she has no future left in India," Bedi said.

The senior Bedi, who had migrated to Norway in 1975 from Hoshairpur in Punjab, said he is coming to India next week to help his daughter, who was extradited from Portugal with Salem on charges of using forged passport.

On fake passport issue, Bedi said she might have used one but insisted that Monica did that under pressure from Salem. "She never did so willingly".

Bedi said though his daughter had referred to Salem in the past, she had never revealed his real identity to the family. "She introduced him as one Sanjay, a friend who helped her get a few films", he said.

Though he first denied that he had 'ever' met Salem, Bedi later conceded that he met the don for the first time in 2002 in Potugal prison after Salem and Monica was arrested there.

"When I first met him, he introduced himself as Sanjay. Salem never gave an impression of being a notorious underworld don," he said adding that during the conversation Salem called him 'Papa'.