Sudha Bharadwaj, a human rights lawyer and trade unionist, talked about Rhea Chakraborty in a new interview. She said that while in jail, she saw Rhea and recalled that the actor had no publicity about herself as she mingled with the inmates and even performed for them on her last day in jail. Rhea, who was late actor Sushant Singh Rajput’s girlfriend at the time of his death in 2020, left Byculla jail after spending 28 days in judicial custody.

Sudha, who was released from Mumbai’s Byculla Jail in December last year after serving three years in jail, was arrested in the Bhima Koregaon case. In a new interview, she said that though Rhea faced media trials and criticism on social media after Sushant’s death, she took it in stride and was very friendly with the inmates of the Byculla Jail while there. Rhea was in jail in a drug case related to the death of Sushant, who was found dead in his Mumbai apartment in June 2020.

Sudha told, “The Sushant Singh Rajput thing had been going on and on and on in the media, like it was crazy. At that time, we used to say that Rhea is being made a scapegoat. We were very unhappy with it. So, I was very glad that she was not brought into the main barrack; she was kept in the special cell. I think she was kept there so that she did not see the TV because people would keep that TV on. All the time hearing about your case would have been too upsetting for her.”

She continued, “I must say for somebody, who had been thrown into a situation like that… for her as a young person, she took it very sportingly. And she was so friendly with people. She was so friendly with the children. The first day (they met her), everybody was going ‘Rhea kahan hai (where is Rhea)?”

She further added, “You know, how people are. But she would never make a thing of it. And when she left, she had some money remaining in her account, so for all the barracks she asked for sweets to be given, and everybody came down to wish her goodbye. Then, everybody said, ‘Rhea, one dance, one dance’. And she actually obliged. So sweet. She danced with them (the inmates).”