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Actors Feroze Khan and Muneeb Butt have both decided to raise a white flag and end their legal battle. Butt announced that he has dropped all charges against Feroze shortly after the latter explained his side and apologised for sharing the personal details of a number of celebrities he had taken action against for speaking in support of his ex-wife.

On Sunday, Feroze shared a detailed apology on Instagram. “On January 17, 2023, a legal notice of defamation (drafted by my former legal team) was posted from my [Instagram]. Somehow, I failed to notice that the said notice contained the personal details of the recipients including their phone numbers. As soon as I realised, I deleted the post immediately within minutes,” he wrote.

The Habs actor shared a picture with Butt on Instagram. “Whatever happened between my family and Muneeb Butt, we have decided to end it here with the guidance of our elders. In the future, we will maintain a relationship of mutual respect and care like a family,” he wrote.

Butt posted the same picture with an identical caption, except for replacing his own name with Feroze’s.

The Baddua actor announced that he has decided to drop charges against Feroze. He had initiated action after Feroze leaked private information of a list of celebrities, including Butt’s wife Aiman Khan and sister-in-law Minal Khan.

“I, Muneeb Butt, and family hereby state that to give us pain and mental distress wasn’t Feroze Khan’s intention. It was a mistake and I announce to drop all the charges,” Butt wrote on Instagram.

He also added that people should have “faith in our judiciary system” and “respect their Feroze and his former wife Aliza Sultan’s privacy and restrain from commenting”.

Aiman and Minal posted identical statements on their respective Instagram accounts.

Minal’s husband, actor Ahsan Mohsin Ikram, did the same.

What happened

In January, Feroze announced that he had served defamation notices to people perpetuating “false and baseless allegations” against him regarding the accusations by his former spouse Aliza Sultan of domestic abuse.

However, in his initial post announcing the notice on Instagram which he later deleted, he shared the names of nine celebrities as well as their private information like their mobile phone numbers and, in some cases, their addresses.

Though Butt was not named in the legal notice, he took to social media on behalf of his wife and sister-in-law in order to take action against Feroze for leaking their personal information.

“Leaking my family’s personal details on your social media trying to play smart by uploading the notice of a law firm and deleting it. Whoever is suggesting this to you has thrown you into deep trouble my friend. I feel bad for you, now you will have to face all of this… Initially I thought it’s [a] stupid mistake and waited for 24 hours but no apology or excuse proved that it was a deliberate move. I thought you were better than that, seriously,” he wrote.

In the third slide of his post, he shared a photo of the cyber complaint he filed against Feroze for cyber stalking in which he expressed how distressed both he and his wife Aiman have been since their private details such as their mobile phone numbers and address were revealed by Feroze.

Muneeb’s complaint also noted that his sister-in-law Minal was also mentioned in Feroze’s legal notice. “Unknown numbers are calling my wife and unknown suspicious people are coming to my residence, which is [a] great security threat to me and my family. We need strict action against Feroze Khan,” read the complaint.

Aiman also shared a statement on Instagram, saying, “Yesterday my private information including my personal phone number was leaked on social media. It was an utterly shameful act which was carried out intentionally by Feroze Khan on the absurd pretext of issuing a legal notice.”

The case

Sultan and Feroze married in 2018 and share a son and a daughter together. They announced their intention to divorce in September and said they were in the middle of court proceedings discussing custody and visitation rights for their two children. Sultan also said she was physically and psychologically abused by her former partner during their marriage. Feroze refused to comment at the time.

In October, Sultan shared emergency room records which marked “blunt injuries on both her arms, her back, chest and face” as well as photos of the bruises as evidence of abuse. Several members of the entertainment industry rallied behind her on social media. A day after Sultan’s allegations, Feroze denied them and vowed to take legal action against the perpetrators of the “rumours”.

A Karachi family court is hearing two cases — one filed by Feroze for custody of their two children and another filed by Sultan for maintenance money for the children. In December, the court ordered the verification of evidence submitted by Sultan. The SHO of the Darakhshan police station and the medico-legal officer of the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre were directed to submit their reports in the case.