Actor couple Aditya Pancholi and Zarina Wahab, whose son Sooraj Pancholi is facing charges of abetting the suicide of actress Jiah Khan, have filed a Rs. 100-crore defamation suit in the Bombay High Court against Rabia Khan, the mother of the deceased.

Two days ago, the High Court, hearing Ms. Khan’s plea, had transferred the probe from Mumbai police to CBI, asking the agency to find out whether it was a case of suicide or homicide.

The suit, filed by the Pancholis, was heard by Justice S.C. Gupte who on Friday asked the plaintiffs to serve a notice on Ms. Khan and posted the matter for further hearing on July 9.

“So far, we have not got any notice but we know that the suit has been filed and would be heard on Wednesday (July 9),” said Ms. Khan’s lawyer Dinesh Tiwari.

The suit, filed by Aditya Pancholi, wife Zarina Wahab and daughter Sana Pancholi, alleged that Ms. Khan, a U.K. national, had posted slanderous, defamatory and abusive comments on Twitter which had put the Pancholi family in poor light in the eyes of the society.

The suit referred to 18 tweets posted by Ms. Khan between March 4 and May 1 which it said were defamatory to the Pancholis. It said in these 18 tweets, Ms. Khan had allegedly made personal comments about the three members of Pancholi family.

The suit said that both Mr. Pancholi and Ms. Wahab had been associated with the film industry for 30 years and had earned goodwill in the society. However, due to attack on them by Ms. Khan in her tweets, the family was defamed and several fans, relatives and friends are “shocked and disturbed”.

“An environment of hatred and embarrassment has been created for us and we have been shunned before the right thinking people in society,” says the suit.

The suit quantifies loss of reputation and goodwill to the Pancholi family at Rs. 50 crore, damages for loss of business at Rs. 25 crore and harassment at another Rs. 25 crore.

Earlier, before filing the suit, the Pancholis had sent a legal notice to Ms. Khan for allegedly making defamatory tweets to which she replied saying she stood by her statements. Ms. Khan further alleged that even the Pancholi family had been making defamatory statements against her.

Ms. Khan also said that the Pancholis were doing this only to deter her from pursuing legal remedies in a court of law against their son Sooraj Pancholi.

Jiah Khan, 25, was found hanging from a ceiling fan at her Juhu home on June 3 last year. Police suspected that she had committed suicide after Sooraj Pancholi, with whom she had a live-in relationship, broke up with her.