The Indian Express (Delhi Edition)
Woman who alleged rape by Gujarat MP held for ‘extortion’
A DAY after K C Patel, the BJP MP from Valsad in Gujarat, accused a woman lawyer of trying to extort money by defaming him, the woman was arrested on Tuesday. The woman had alleged that the MP had raped her on multiple occasions.
A special court on Tuesday sent the woman to police custody for five days.
The woman has claimed that police refused to take her complaint against the MP, forcing her to lodge a complaint in a Delhi court last week. The court had sought an Action Taken Report from the police on April 26. The case will come up for hearing next on May 11.
Inanfirfiledatnorthavenue police station in New Delhi, Patel accused the woman of trying to extort Rs 7 crore from him. He alleged that she drugged him and filmedavideoofhiminacompromising position to extort money.
Seeking her custody, Delhi Police on Tuesday told the court that they need to interrogate her and find out about her associates. The police also said they need time to recover the video footage from the CCTV camera in her house that was reportedly used to film the purported video.
The woman has been charged under IPC Sections 384 (extortion), 389 (putting person in fear of accusation in order to extort), 120 (B) (criminal conspiracy), along with Section 8 (influencing public servant by corrupt means).
On Tuesday, a police source claimed that the woman had initially approached Ghaziabad Police to lodge a complaint against Patel, and was asked to approach Delhi Police. The source claimed that the complaint was lodged at North Avenue police station but she allegedly refused to undergo a medical examination and record her statement before the magistrate.
The police reportedly told her to return after 15 days and again asked her to undergo medical examination and to record her statement, which she allegedly refused again.
The woman’s lawyer, Shahid Anwar, called it a “man-gadhant kahaani (concocted story)” by the police. “Today they (police) could pick her up from Ghaziabad, but they could not conduct a medical check-up? They never sought (her) medical examination,” he said.
On police’s assertion that she didnotwanttorecordastatement beforethemagistrate,anwarsaid the petition filed before the magistrate, seeking registration of an FIR against Patel, is equivalent of a statement. But the police, he said, never sought to record her statement before the magistrate.
Special Commissioner of Police (New Delhi) M K Meena said, “The woman had (even) last year alleged that an MP had raped her. We filed an FIR but she took a U-turn 10 days later.”
Anwar said he is not aware of anything that happened last year.
On Monday, Patel had said in Valsad, “Allegations made by the woman are baseless. She wanted to defame me .... ”