Police may summon for questioning Bollywood actress Shilpa Shetty in connection with a three-year-old case in which her parents allegedly told a gangster to threaten a Surat-based businessman.

Police, however, say the actress would be called for questioning only after the gangster, Fazal ur Rehman, who allegedly made the threat calls to the businessman, is interrogated.

"As of now we have sought the custody of Fazal from the Delhi court as he is in police custody there. Once he is brought here and questioned we will decide if Shilpa is to be summoned," Surat's Deputy Commissioner of Police Subhash Trivedi said.

The extortion case resurfaced recently after Fazal claimed during his interrogation by Delhi Police that Shilpa had contacted him to seek help in threatening textile businessman Pankaj Agarwal, who owns the `Parag' brand of sarees.

The matter made headlines in November 2003 when the Surat police arrested Shilpa's mother Sunanda and also registered a case against her father in connection with the case.

Shilpa's mother is presently on bail but the probe was on. Shilpa, who recently won a reality show in Britain, was supposed to do ad commercials for the saree brand but the deal did not work out and this caused some animosity between the Shettys and the businessman.

Fazlu, arrested from the Indo-Nepal border in August 2006, is allegedly involved in more than two dozen offences of kidnapping, extortion and attempt to murder.