Monday (December 16): Former BJP MLA Kuldeep Sengar was guilty of abducting and raping a minor in Unnao in 2017 by Delhi court today. However, co-accused Shashi Singh has been acquitted in the case.
The quantum of punishment will be decided on December 18.
“Sengar was a powerful person, the victim was a village girl, not from a cosmopolitan educated area which led to delay in filing case. I found her statement truthful, unblemished that she was sexually assaulted and under threat,” the court said.
The Court also referred to vendetta against the victim, and said that several cases were filed against her family members after she wrote to the chief minister of Uttar Pradesh.
The court pulled up the CBI for the delay in filing chargesheet in the case and said it prolonged trial against Sengar.
Sengar broke down in court after hearing the verdict. According to news agencyPTI, he was seen crying beside his sister.
District Judge Dharmesh Sharma convicted Sengar for rape under IPC and POCSO Act for the offence of public servant committing penetrative sexual assault against a child. The offences entail a maximum punishment of life imprisonment.
Now aged 19, the woman was kidnapped and raped by Sengar in 2017. He was arrested in April last year, days after the girl threatened to set herself ablaze in front of UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath’s home in Lucknow if the police didn’t file her complaint. Sengar, a four-time BJP MLA from UP’s Bangermau, was expelled from the party in August 2019.
On July 28 this year, the car of the victim was hit by a truck and she was severely injured. The woman’s two aunts were killed in the accident and her family had alleged foul play. A special court was also held at AIIMS Hospital to record the statement of the woman, who was admitted there after being rushed from a hospital in Lucknow.
Her father was allegedly framed in an illegal arms case and arrested on April 3, 2018. He died in judicial custody a few days later, on April 9. A local court has framed murder and other charges against the MLA, his brother Atul and nine others in the murder case.
