MAOIST CULT LEADER ON SEX SLAVE CHARGES

COMMIE: Cult leader accused

of sex assaults A COMMUNIST cult leader, who allegedly kept three women as slaves and sexually assaulted them for more than 30 years has appeared in court charged with 25 offences.

Maoist Aravindan Balakrishnan, 74, who was known as Comrade Bala, faces four counts of rape and 19 charges of indecent assault against the three women.

He is also accused of one count of cruelty to a person under 16 years and one count of false imprisonment. All the charges relate to the period between January 1980 and October 2013.

Mr Balakrishnan, a follower of former China leader Mao Zedong, appeared at Southwark Crown Court in London sporting a receding grey mullet, and dressed in a blue coat and grey trousers. He spoke only to confirm his identity.

During the brief hearing, Judge Anthony Leonard set him a provisional trial date of July 20. servitude by the couple after joining their group.

Pattni, 67, was released without charge in September after 10 months on bail.

At a previous hearing last month Balakrishnan was remanded on bail on condition he continues to live in Edmonton, that he does not apply for any international travel documents or that he contact the three victims or two female witnesses. He was bailed until March 4.

Described as a “guru”, Balakrishnan set up a communist squat, the Mao Zedong Memorial Centre, in Brixton in 1976 where the couple ran their group, the Workers’ Institute of Marxism- LeninismMao Tse Tung Thought, holding lectures and film evenings.