SC to hear appeal against actor Vijay Babu’s bail today
NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court will hear on Wednesday a petition filed by the Kerala government opposing the anticipatory bail granted by Kerala high court to actor-cum-producer Vijay Babu in an alleged rape case.
The complainant, a 25-yearold Malayalam film actor, who accused Vijay Babu of sexually assaulting her, has also filed an appeal against the high court’s June 22 order saying that “each day he spends outside of custody poses a threat to her and other witnesses” in the case.
A vacation bench of justices Indira Banerjee and JK Maheshwari of the Supreme Court ordered the petition to be listed for hearing on Wednesday on a joint mentioning made by senior advocate Jaideep Gupta for the state and advocate Raghenth Basant for the complainant.
The high court directed accused Vijay Babu to surrender on June 27 and allowed the Kerala Police to question him till July 3. “This is a man who initially ran away to Dubai and then to Georgia and came back only when his passport was impounded by authorities here…The urgency is that until we get this order vacated, we cannot interrogate him further,” said Gupta.
Basant, appearing for the complainant, said, “He came on Facebook Live and revealed my name to the entire world. Each day he is outside is a threat to me.” Considering the serious nature of the allegations, the bench agreed to give an urgent listing for the two petitions.
The high court order heard both the state and the complainant before granting pre-arrest bail to the accused. In coming to this conclusion, the June 22 order noted that the fact of the accused being married was known to the victim and so long as this marriage subsisted there was no possibility of a legal marriage with the complainant.
In her complaint to the police, the actor alleged that she was raped by the accused first on March 16 this year and later on several occasions. Once, she was even subjected to physical torture when she resisted his attempt. The police registered the first information report (FIR) against Vijay Babu on April 22 under sections 376 (rape), 506 (criminal intimidation) and 323 (causing hurt) under the Indian Penal Code. Soon after the registration of FIR, the accused fled to Dubai.
According to the prosecution, the conduct of the accused was not above board as he revealed the survivor’s name on Facebook Live on April 26 and to evade arrest, escaped to Georgia since India does not have any extradition treaty with this country. A separate case is pending trial against the accused for disclosing the survivor’s identity.