A special court has ordered to proceed with the matter of framing charges against three Uttar Pradesh policemen who initially handled the rape case against BJP ex-MLA Kuldeep Singh Sengar in 2017 for failing to record allegations of the minor victim against the leader, officials said.The court recently rejected the petition of Kunwar Bahadur Singh, then posted as Circle Officer of Safipur in Unnao, seeking discharge from the case filed by the CBI.
The case was lodged under Section 166-A of the IPC for not recording the victim’s complaint that she was raped by Sengar on June 4, 2017, they said. Facing inaction even after her complaint to the Chief Minister’s Office remained unaddressed, the victim tried to immolate herself in front of the chief minister’s residence in Lucknow on April 8, 2018, which snowballed into a major political issue.
Besides Singh, the court has also ordered to proceed with the case of framing of charges against DP Shukla, former SHO of Makhi Police Station, and Digvijay Singh, sub-inspector, who were also charge-sheeted, they said.It is alleged that the victim in her application to Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on August 17, 2017, had alleged that she was raped by Sengar on June 4 that year and later gang-raped by three other men on June 11, but the police did not take action on her complaint.Her complaint was registered in the Chief Minister’s grievance portal and forwarded to Kunwar Bahadur Singh for inquiry.The victim had appeared before Singh and admitted that she had made the complaint, the CBI inquiry showed. Singh had forwarded the complaint to DP Shukla who handed it over to Digvijay Singh who had conducted the inquiry.In the inquiry report submitted on August 24, 2017, Digvijay said a case was already registered, referring to the incident on June 11, 2017, at Makhi Police Station in which a charge-sheet has already been filed but it did not say anything about rape by Sengar on June 4, 2017.”He mentioned in the report that other allegations by the complainant are baseless and she is habitual of giving the applications,” the CBI alleged.Sengar has been sentenced to life imprisonment by a special CBI court for raping the minor who had come to his house seeking employment on June 4, 2017.
Based on the inquiry report submitted by Digvijay, Kunwar Bahadur Singh also submitted his report on November 25, 2017, in which he mentioned details of the action by police in the incident of June 11, 2017, but nothing was mentioned of the June 4 incident, the court has noted.The CBI has alleged that these officers being public servants had neither properly inquired nor ensured proper inquiry of the allegations, particularly related to the complaint of rape against Sengar.
