BJP MLA Munirathna
Credit: DH Photo
Bengaluru: Police have registered a case against Karnataka BJP MLA N Munirathna for repeated rape, sexual harassment, and voyeurism following a complaint filed by a 40-year-old woman.
The third FIR against the MLA in less than a week was registered on Wednesday. The MLA was arrested on September 4 in an FIR registered under the SC/STs Atrocity Act and an order on his bail application is likely to be passed on Thursday.
Munirathna has been granted anticipatory bail in the second FIR registered against him by a BBMP contractor.
The woman social worker, in the third FIR which was filed on September 18, has accused Munirathna of raping her multiple times between 2020 and 2022 and threatening her into conspiring with him to commit criminal offences.
Six more have been named in the FIR for assisting Munirathna in the criminal conspiracy who have been identified as Vijay Kumar, Sudhakar, Kiran Kumar, Lohith Gowda, Manjunatha, and Loki.
Kaggalipura police from Ramanagara district have invoked IPC Sections 376 (repeated rape), 354 (sexual harassment), 354 (C) (voyeurism), 506 (criminal intimidation), 504 (intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of the peace), 120 (B) (criminal conspiracy), 149 (every member of an unlawful assembly guilty of an offence committed in prosecution of a common object), 384 (extortion), 406 (criminal breach of trust), 308 (attempt to commit culpable homicide) and the IT Act in the FIR.
According to the FIR, Munirathna learnt about the woman through her social work and contacted her via WhatsApp in 2020.
A few days later, he met her in person near Muthyalanagar in north-west Bengaluru and befriended her and the two subsequently developed a friendship after exchanging texts on WhatsApp.
According to the FIR, Munirathna allegedly asked the victim to strip on a video call, but the latter refused to do it. A few days later, he called the woman to his godown in Muthyalanagar, where he allegedly made a sexual advance, prompting her to resist.
The woman claimed that Munirathna bragged about his political clout and raped her, threatening to get her falsely framed in a case if she refused to oblige to his requests.
“He showed me the CCTV cameras installed in the godown and threatened to morph my pictures and make them viral if I didn’t listen to him and refused to do all his work,” the woman told the police.
According to the FIR, Munirathna threatened her with the same videos and coaxed her into helping him honeytrap the husband of a former corporator by sending a woman with her.
Later, he revealed to her that the woman was an HIV-infected person. She claimed that he had directed her to honeytrap the ex-corporator's son as well, but she refused to do so and went incommunicado.
Further, Munirathna allegedly threatened her into making explicit videos of a leader from his rival party during the election and used it to threaten her. He also made similar videos of police officers and blackmailed them, according to the woman.
According to the FIR, Munirathna pleaded with the complainant to help him in damaging the image of Kavitha (name changed), a woman he knew, claiming it was the last help he would ask from her.
Munirathna allegedly formed a team (including four accused in the FIR) and arranged a birthday party where Kavitha was also invited. Munirathna directed the complainant to befriend Kavitha and get her number.
Further, he asked the woman to develop friendship with Kavitha and invite her to a resort. On three separate trips on three different occasions to different resorts, the team formed by Munirathna allegedly took private videos and pictures of Kavitha and also attempted to frame her in a criminal case.
Narrating all these incidents, the complainant requested the police to initiate an action against the BJP MLA.