A former Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) minister has been booked for allegedly raping a woman repeatedly, police said on Friday
Sucha Singh Langah was booked on Thursday night after a woman who is a widow lodged a complaint that the Akali leader had raped her on several occasions since 2009 and had threatened her to keep silent, they said.
Langah termed it “political vendetta” and “premeditated with a desperate attempt to try and win the coming by-election”.
The district police is hell bent on framing me in false cases to please political bosses. The complainant is an employee of Punjab Police. On the most bizarre and unbelievable allegations, in tearing haste, the FIR was registered within a few hours.Sucha Singh Langah
The victim has filed an affidavit and gave a pen drive with a video recording to support her accusation, SSP Harcharan Singh Bhullar said.
The victim, also a constable, met Langah first in 2009, when her family approached him to secure a job. The victim had only then lost her husband – also a constable – and had two children to look after. She was also Langah's daughter's classmate.
Langah, then the agriculture minister in Punjab, asked to meet her two days later.
I begged the minister to spare me. I even tried reminding him that I was his daughter’s classmate, and therefore like a daughter to him. But he wouldn’t listen. He told me that having sexual relations with him was the only way I could get a government job.The victim to Hindustan Times
The woman also alleged that Langah had cheated her of money.
Langah sold a one-acre plot of land that belonged to me in Sohal village under the pretext of buying property for me in Chandigarh. Though he made Rs 30 lakh from that transaction, I got a paltry Rs 4.5 lakh. When I protested, he got a local bank to issue a loan of Rs 8 lakh in my name. However, even from that I got just Rs 1 lakh.The FIR
Langah has been booked under Sections 376 (rape), 384 (extortion), 420 (cheating) and 506 (criminal intimidation) of the IPC.
(With inputs from PTI, IANS)
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