Gujarat: 21-Yr-Old Woman Who Accused Former BJP MLA Of Rape Goes Missing

A woman, who had written a letter on July 10 to police alleging rape against BJP lawmaker Jayanti Bhanushali, has been untraceable, says Surat police.

The 21-year-old victim from Surat wrote a letter requesting to file a case of rape against the BJP lawmaker who represented the Abdasa constituency between 2007 and 2012. This led to him being ousted from the party. The 53-year-old in his resignation letter, which was accepted by state BJP president Jitu Vaghani, denied all allegations against him.

What happened?

Police Commissioner Satish Sharma said that despite various summons that has been issued, she has failed to appear in the police station to record her statement. “We had tried to contact the complainant and sent her summons on the address given in the letter received in order to record her statement,” Mr Sharma said.

“A notice was pasted on the door of the house of the complainant as nobody was present there when police arrived,” he added. “She is untraceable. We are trying to contact her but have failed so far,” he said further, reported NDTV.

The survivor did not approach the police station herself, neither did she send a relative and hence a formal case is yet to be registered.

In her complaint letter, it was mentioned that she was raped on several occasions by the BJP lawmaker in November last year after promising her of a job at a reputed fashion design institute. The act was allegedly video graphed by his assistants.

Received another letter

The Commissioner said that the survivor’s identity is still unclear as the police were sent another letter in April by somebody with the same name as that of a survivor warning them to not believe any accusations against the lawmaker from believing.

“We had received another notarized letter in her name, sent to us in April, saying that somebody is trying to make a false application in her name against Bhanushali. She had asked the police to ignore such a complaint,” he said.

The Logical Indian urges the Surat police to find the alleged rape victim considering that a powerful person is being alleged of rape. Security of the woman is paramount in this case and we hope police find her soon.