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Delhi court rejects police report to cancel rape FIR against Shahnawaz Hussain
Shahnawaz Hussain has denied the charge, saying the complainant had a marital discord with his brother and unnecessarily dragged him into the case
NEW DELHI: A Delhi court on Tuesday rejected the Delhi Police’s report to close the first information report (FIR) case against Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Shahnawaz Hussain alleging rape and criminal intimidation and took cognisance of the charges.
Additional chief metropolitan magistrate (ACMM) Vaibhav Mehta, who rejected the cancellation report, also ordered that Shahnawaz Hussain be present before the court on October 20, the next date of hearing.
“This court takes cognizance of the offences u/s 376 (rape), 328 (causing hurt by means of poison, etc with intent to commit an offence) and 506 (criminal intimidation) IPC. Accordingly, Accused Syed Shahnawaz Hussain be summoned through SHO PS concerned for the next date of hearing”, Mehta said, allowing a plea by the woman who accused the senior politician of rape and opposed the cancellation report filed by the police.
In her complaint, the woman alleged that Hussain took her to his farmhouse in south Delhi’s Chhatarpur on April 18, 2018, on the pretext that his brother and wife were there. The woman alleged that she was drugged and raped by Hussain who also threatened her.
Shahnawaz Hussain has previously denied the allegations, saying that the complainant had a marital discord with his brother and had unnecessarily dragged him into the case.
The Delhi Police filed a cancellation report in August 2023, stating that no material has come on record to substantiate the allegations or to file the chargesheet in the matter and no prima facie case is made out.
The woman filed a protest petition against the cancellation report, saying the police didn’t want to investigate the politician from the beginning and had adopted a negative approach with the objective of closing the complaint. She also underlined that it had taken her five years to get the police to investigate Hussain after even the Supreme Court in January this year refused to cancel the FIR.
The ACMM explained why the court was going ahead with the trial. “Here is a woman before the court who is stating before the police and before the court, repeatedly, that she has been raped by being intoxicated; unless IO (investigating officer) brings such material on record to establish that there is no possibility that she could have been raped, this court has no reason to throw out her case at the outset”.
“Statement of the prosecutrix u/s 164 Cr.P.C. is the most clinching piece of evidence, especially in case of rape as there are seldom any eye-witnesses to such heinous offences. Whether the statement of the complainant is reliable or not can be found out only after the same is put to scrutiny before the court of trial”, Mehta said in his order.
The judge also underlined that while taking cognizance of an offence, the court is only required to see whether prima facie, an offence appears to have been committed or not, and was not required to test the authenticity of witnesses.
According to the woman, she first approached the Mehrauli police with a formal complaint of rape on April 22, 2018. Four days later, she approached the police commissioner’s office. She was subsequently called to the Mehrauli police station on three occasions to record her statement but a FIR was not registered.
She eventually approached the metropolitan magistrate concerned who ordered the registration of an FIR on July 7, 2018. Hussain filed a review petition against the order, but it was dismissed on July 12.
A petition to cancel the FIR was filed next before the Delhi high court, which upheld the magistrate’s decision on August 17, 2022. Hussain also approached the Supreme Court, reasoning that the complainant woman initially filed the case against his brother and targeted him due to his social status. But the top court declined to interfere on January 16, 2023: “This is a case where the FIR was not even registered (by police). Let it be investigated. You may be a victim, but there is possibility of the reverse.”
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