Jailed Bollywood star 'in tears'

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Bollywood actor Sanjay Dutt has spent a troubled first night in a Mumbai jail, according to a fellow prison inmate.

The prisoner, who said that he sleeps near Dutt's cell, told a prison visitor interviewed by the BBC's Zubair Ahmed that the actor is often in tears.

He said that Dutt is too hot in his cell, has not been eating and finds his bed and prison clothes uncomfortable.

Dutt was jailed for six years on Tuesday for buying weapons from bombers who attacked Mumbai (Bombay) in 1993.

The fellow convict said that Dutt appeared not to enjoy food served to him by the prison authorities, which consisted of daal, chapattis, rice and vegetables.

The actor was reported only to have eaten when the inmate who shares a cell with him offered him two apples. The star told fellow inmates to pray for him.

Dutt's first night in prison has received saturation coverage in the Indian media which have gone into great detail about the conditions he faces in Cell Number One in Mumbai's Arthur Road Jail.

Clothes 'too rough'

Our correspondent says that the cell has three rooms - with an attached toilet and shower - as well as a hall.

Crowded Mumbai places were targeted in the attacks

Dutt's neighbour in the adjoining cell is his friend, Yousuf Nullwalla, who was also convicted along with him in the 1993 bombings case.

Another inmate told the BBC that Dutt had been summoned by the jail superintendent who asked him if he was comfortable.

The star was wearing a white striped jail uniform but was in some discomfort, complaining that the cloth was too rough.

The authorities agreed to allow him access to medicine and cigarettes.

That concession follows an unusual conversation between the trial judge PD Kode and the Bollywood star after he was sentenced on Tuesday.

Dutt told the judge that he was "more than family for all of us".

The judge replied by saying that Dutt had "shot for movies, doing remarkably well in the film line".

He urged Dutt not to be sentimental, and to "be calm and quiet".

Gangster roles

The star's lawyers plan to appeal against his sentence. They argued on Tuesday that he should remain free on bail because of good behaviour, but the judge ruled against leniency.

Dutt, 48, is the most high-profile of 100 people convicted in connection with the blasts which killed 257 people.

The actor was cleared of conspiracy, but found guilty of illegally possessing a rifle and a pistol.

Dutt found fame playing gangsters and anti-heroes. His trial generated huge interest among Bollywood fans across India.

The son of a Hindu father and Muslim mother, he said the weapons were necessary in order to defend his family during Hindu-Muslim rioting of 1993, which followed the destruction by Hindu zealots of the Babri mosque in Ayodhya.

The Mumbai blasts were allegedly carried out by Mumbai's Muslim-dominated underworld in retaliation for the riots in which most of those killed were Muslim.