This is the third FIR against the Karnataka BJP MLA Munirathna in recent weeks.

The Karnataka Police on Wednesday booked state BJP MLA Munirathna, who is in judicial custody in connection with a case of harassment and casteist abuse, on charges of rape, criminal intimidation, and blackmailing among others.

Six others identified as Vijay Kumar, Sudhakar, Kiran Kumar, Lohith Gowda, Manjunatha, and Loki have also been named in the First Information Report (FIR) for assisting Munirathna’s criminal conspiracies, said the police.

According to the police complaint, Munirathna allegedly sexually abused a 40-year-old woman multiple times between 2020 and 2022, and used her to honeytrap many others and infect a former corporator’s husband with HIV. The woman, according to the FIR, was called to meet Munirathna at his office after he came to know she had supplied more than 5,000 masks through the former corporator during the pandemic.

After the meeting, Muniratha allegedly started sending messages and calling the woman on WhatsApp. According to the FIR, he used to video call the woman more than 10 times a day and even asked for her a “nude call” — which she refused. A few days later, he asked her to visit him and took her to his godown. The woman alleged that Munirathna tried to hug her and told her “it was all common in politics”. When the woman objected, Munirathna threatened to file a case against her and allegedly sexually assaulted her.

Munirathna then claimed he had recorded the sexual assault and threatened to circulate her nude photos and videos. According to the complaint, he allegedly again sexually assaulted her by blackmailing her using the same videos. “He also showed those videos on the television and I was shocked. I begged him to delete the videos and then he assured me to delete only if I do whatever he says,” said the woman in the complaint.

According to FIR, Munirathna also forced the woman to have a sexual relationship with the husband of a former corporator, and record videos. The woman said she agreed as she was being blackmailed by the videos, the FIR added. She was told to meet a woman and take her to this man in an apartment with secret cameras. The victim introduced the woman to Vasudev with whom he allegedly had sex. Munirathna watched it live on a laptop and stored the video.

After the woman told Munirathna she did not want any association with him and requested him to delete the videos, he threatened to show the clips to her husband and children. Scared by the threat, according to the FIR, the victim met Munirathna who told her the woman sent to have sex with the former corporator’s husband was HIV positive. He asked the woman to send an HIV-positive patient to the former corporator’s son. The woman, according to the FIR, declined and switched off her mobile phone.

According to the complaint, the woman was again forced to sleep with a man named Ganganna and threatened him during the Karnataka Assembly elections last year with the video.

The FIR said the woman met Munirathna again requesting him to delete the videos, and he promised to do it but only after another “operation”. Munirathna claimed he wanted to malign a woman’s image as she was threatening his relatives. The victim was directed to befriend the woman and get her number, according to the FIR. He allegedly directed the victim to develop a friendship with her and later invited her on trips. This woman’s private videos and photos were allegedly taken during these trips using secret cameras installed in the rooms where she stayed. As per Munirathna’s directions, his gunman Vijay Kumar also planted a packet of narcotics substance in her bag.

The police have invoked Indian Penal Code (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), and 308 (attempt to commit culpable homicide), and those under the IT Act in the FIR against Munirathna.

Source: indianexpress