Cop probing rape complaint stalked her, woman tells police

MUMBAI: A police inspector from Borivli has been accused of stalking and propositioning a rape survivor whose case he was handling.
Disgusted by investigating officer Anil Avadh’s lewd comments, the 40-year-old survivor complained to a deputy commissioner of police in March and recently wrote to police commissioner Rakesh Maria. The police chief has ordered an inquiry, but Avadh, attached to the MHB police station, refuted the allegations.
In her complaint to Maria, the woman claimed inspector Avadh came near her house soon after she filed the rape complaint and asked her to meet him for the investigation. He allegedly passed lewd comments over her T-shirt when she went down to meet him.
In March, the woman who is divorced with two children filed a complaint with the MHB police station alleging that 24-year-old Shyam Kumar had raped her and duped her of cash and gold ornaments worth Rs 5 lakh.
“Shyam told us that he will be available after May 5, the last day of his final examination. So we did not arrest him. The woman believed that police were helping the accused and hence she made this wild allegation against me. I have sought permission from my seniors to file a defamation case against her,” said Avadh.
“According to the Supreme Court’s guidelines, a lady police officer should have been investigating my complaint of rape and cheating. Further, I was made to sit in the police station on two consecutive days and the FIR was registered only on the second day at 12.30am despite the guidelines clearly stating that women should not be detained in a police station after dusk,” the woman told TOI.
“We have received a complaint against Avadh. I have ordered a high-level inquiry and assigned the case to new DCP Supriya Pathak, who will probably take charge on Monday,” said joint commissioner of police (law and order) Deven Bharti. Senior inspector Subhash Chauhan refused comment.
In her complaint of rape, the woman alleged she met the accused during Sunday mass after which they stayed in touch on Whatsapp and he visited her home on occasions. Shyam was then studying engineering in a Kerala college. Last November, he reportedly messaged her to say he was returning from Kerala and requested her to pick him up from Thane station. They came to her house where Shyam offered her mineral water and she fell unconscious on drinking it. When she regained consciousness and realised she had been sexually assaulted, she protested at which Shyam allegedly promised to marry her. He later maintained physical relations with her but when she was pregnant, she alleged Shyam took her to a clinic in Borivli, posing as her husband, and forced her to undergo an abortion.
Moreover, during the course of their relationship, he extracted a total of Rs 5 lakh from her on several pretexts like paying his college fees and his mother’s treatment in Dubai. The woman realised she was duped when in March she confronted him for marriage. She claimed she even called up Shyam’s mother and complained about him, following which his elder brother Tarun called her to threaten her against calling their mother.