Stage 1: The process began early enough, when the talk of my extradition with Salem from Portugal was at its height around May 2005. I enrolled in an online detox programme. I started to wear less revealing clothes, because I didn’t want revealing photographs. I also applied for asylum in Portugal, where Salem and I had run away. I said I was married to a Muslim and would not be treated in a fair way in India.

Stage 2: But I am extradited anyway on November 11, with Salem. Next day, I am taken to Hyderabad, where I am put behind bars in Chanchalguda jail. I am wanted in connection with three fake passports, one of which was issued from Andhra Pradesh. On that day, I am still wearing an animal print top from which I am squeezing out, but you will notice the cleavage display has already shrunk. I am also wearing a little foundation, some lipstick and mascara and eye shadow, but my most notable accessory is a sturdy policewoman.

Stage 3: I am already free of some real wrinkles in my brain. I stun the court in Hyderabad on November 19 by saying that I am not married to Abu Salem. I repeat to the court that I am single.

I also tell the court that all the three fake passports allegedly used by me — the first was in the name of Neha Jaffri; the second, issued in Bhopal in June 2001, was in the name of Fauzia Usman; the third was a Pakistani passport in the name of Sana Kamal — were obtained under Salem’s influence.

In jail, I begin to eat more rotis and avoid rice.

Stage 4: The difference begins to show. During my numerous visits to the court, which are very well photographed, the new woman in me begins to surface. I have dropped make-up, my skin looks fresh. I never look up, I contemplate my feet and look downcast. If I have to smile, I just stretch my lips. I look contrite.

But the biggest change: I am into salwar kurtas. I have chosen cotton. During this time, one day my father visited me in jail. His jaw dropped. His dear daughter was in a cotton salwar kameez! I told him that cotton was the best cloth for the dry and dusty cell where she now lived.

Stage 5: In September 2006, the CBI sentenced me to five years’ rigorous imprisonment for cheating, criminal conspiracy and impersonation while securing a fake passport in Kurnool district in Andhra Pradesh. I filed an appeal at the high court.

By this time, salwar kurtas are my second skin. Abu Salem’s name does not crop up so much in reports on me. I have lost nearly 10 kg. To avoid sunburn, I have chosen indoor activities like tailoring and embroidery in jail, rather than making soap outside. I also teach dance and yoga to other women inmates.

Stage 6: From March 2007, things speed up. Andhra Pradesh High Court reduces my term by two years, as I was already in prison in Portugal for nine months. I have spent two years and four months in prison.

On July 16, I am acquitted by a Bhopal court in another fake passport case. On July 25, after a favourable order from the Supreme Court that said that I would not have to surrender my original passport (yes, I had one of those, too) as it was lost, I was released from the Chanchalguda jail, in jeans and a pink kurta, and was received by my father.

I was looking like a flower (much better than that Kangana Ranaut in Gangster). I could be mistaken for a demure daughter, which I had become. I looked so nice against the gods and goddesses at the family altar, in my village Hoshiarpur in Punjab, where I was born. Though my parents later settled in Norway.

I have a number of film offers. I also want to play a policewoman and act with Amitabh Bachchan — and the latter may be easier.

I have come a long way. I can even retox.

Main Monica Bedi hoon.

(Ghost-written by t2)