Skeletons have tumbled out of Arunachal Pradesh chief minister Pema Khandu’s cupboard with a woman alleging that the CM had raped her way back in 2008 when she was a minor. However, as per a report published in scroll.in, Khandu has got a breather as the Supreme Court on Friday refused to entertain a petition filed by the woman saying that the court cannot interfere in an incident which took place 11 years back.
The Supreme Court bench comprising Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi, Justice Deepak Gupta and Justice Sanjeev Khanna turned down the plea. The report further stated that the court asked the complainant to approach the High Court with her plea and also said that she could approach “appropriate authorities” for police protection. However, the woman said that she approached the Supreme Court only after the police and chief judicial magistrate shut the doors on her and refused to register a criminal complaint against Khandu.
The complainant said that in 2008, as a 15-year-old, she was working in a Public Call Office in Arunachal Pradesh. A man approached her and lured her into a meeting with the promise of a government job. Thereafter, four men, including Khandu, who allegedly introduced himself as an Army Colonel, made her consume a spiked soft drink, and then raped her.
The complainant said that she was unaware of the real identities of the accused till in 2012, she said she realised one of them was Khandu, when she saw his photograph in the newspaper. The BJP leader was the Tourism Minister of Arunachal Pradesh during that time.
The complainant had also named two others in her plea – Thupten Tashi, a teacher at a government school and Dorjee Wangchu, an assistant mineral development officer at Ziro. The ‘victim’ had formally submitted a report to the National Commission of Women (NCW) in March 2018. Senior advocates Kapil Sibal and Krishnan Venugopal and advocates MS Vishnu Shankar and Sriram Parakkat appeared for the petitioner.
