Wife says Rajasthan chief secretary molested their teenage daughter

JAIPUR: The wife of Rajasthan’s chief secretary OP Me en a accused him on Saturday of sexually abusing their daughter when she was a teenager, but the top civil

JAIPUR: The wife of Rajasthan’s chief secretary OP Me en a accused him on Saturday of sexually abusing their daughter when she was a teenager, but the top civil servant denied the charge as baseless.

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Geeta Singh Deo told a press conference that their daughter, who is now 31 and lives abroad, sent an email about this to the Rajasthan High Court in April, urging action against her father. She distributed copies of the purported email at the press conference. HT has a copy of it.

HT sent an email to Deo’s daughter to confirm the veracity of her mother’s statement but had not heard back from her till the time of going to press.

Asked about the allegations, Meena dismissed them as “baseless”, saying he did not remember when he had last met his daughter. “I am not aware of any such matter. Anybody can say anything,” he said.

The couple is estranged and has been living separately for three years. Deo filed a case of domestic violence against her husband in September last year, triggering a police investigation.

Deo, an officer of the state administrative service, quoted her daughter’s purported email as saying Meena would go into her room and touch her at “wrong places”. The alleged molestation stopped when her daughter told her about it, Deo said. Deo also accused the police of dragging their feet on her domestic violence complaint under pressure from her husband’s family. Meena’s brothers are powerful politicians.

But Kavita Sharma, the investigating officer in the case, denied any political pressure and expressed surprise with Deo’s allegations of sexual abuse of her daughter. “I had taken the statement of her daughter in March this year and she didn’t mention a single thing about sexual harassment ,” said Sharma .“It is surprising that she would write the letter to the court the very next month saying that she was molested.”