Police investigate plot to ‘sell’ Slumdog’s Rubina Ali

Indian police are investigating whether the father of Rubina Ali, one of the child stars in the multi-Oscar-winning film Slumdog Millionaire, tried to sell his daughter for £200,000. An undercover reporter from the News of the World claimed on Sunday that he had persuaded Rafiq Qureshi to sell his nine-year-old daughter (pictured with her co-star Azharuddin Mohammed Ismail) to a wealthy family from Dubai.

According to a new report in the Independent, it is understood that Rubina's mother, Khurshid Ali, may have warned local police that her former husband was planning to sell their daughter - two weeks before the News of the World arrived in the Mumbai slums.

Outside Rubina's shack on Monday, Khurshid had a physical fight with Rafiq's new wife Munni over allegations that both sides were trying to cash in on Slumdog's success. The film won a total of eight Oscars including the coveted 'best film' award and has taken more than £200m at the worldwide box office. Munni claims that Khurshid Ali has only become interested in her daughter's welfare since the Oscars. "For seven years before that, she didn't care. Why would we sell Rubina? She is her father's favourite."

Meanwhile Raqfiq has been strenuously denying the suggestions that he tried to hand his daughter over to a Dubai-based family in return for £200,000 compensation. He told the BBC that he had been lured to the hotel where the reporters conducted a meeting with him on the pretence of a job offer. "They tricked us into fakery," he told the BBC, “but we came out unscathed."