Just in: Sanjay Dutt will surrender at the TADA court today. The actor withdraws his plea to surrender at the Pune jail.  Dutt, convicted in the 1993 bomb blasts case, told a Terrorist and Disruptive Activities court yesterday, that he was facing threat to life from fundamentalist groups and hence should be allowed to surrender before the Yerwada jail instead of the special court on Mumbai.  

Dutt filed an application before special TADA Judge G A Sanap seeking permission to surrender before the Yerwada jail in Pune instead of giving himself up before the special court in south Mumbai.

Dutt, whose conviction under the Arms Act was upheld by the Supreme Court recently, is supposed to surrender on May 16. However, the apex court had reduced to five years the six-year jail term awarded to Dutt by a designated TADA court in 2006 while ruling out his release on probation, saying the "nature" of his offence was "serious". The applicant (Dutt) is facing a threat to life from fundamentalist groups and those with vested interests," the application said.

It further claimed that the actor wanted to avoid a situation of the past when media persons and camera persons had chased his vehicle from Mumbai to Pune last time he was taken to jail after the TADA court convicted him.