Court convicted former MP Prajwal Revanna in domestic help rape case
Bengaluru: In the rape case of a domestic help, a special court for elected representatives found Prajwal Revanna guilty and expelled Hassan MP, a former member of the Lok Sabha and leader of the JD(S). The court will determine the extent of the sentence tomorrow for Prajwal, the grandson of former Prime Minister HD Deve Gowda, who was found guilty in one of the four rape cases filed against him.
Prajwal Revanna broke down and was seen crying as the decision against him was announced.
In relation to the rape of a domestic worker at a farmhouse in Holenarasipura, Hassan district, Revanna was found guilty. At the Hassan District’s Holenarasipura Rural Police Station, a charge was filed against him.
Earlier, Judge Santosh Gajanan Bhat had delayed the ruling, which was supposed to be revealed on July 30, in order to get clarity on a few technical issues. Today, the judgment was made public.
Ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, leaked footage of several women being sexually harassed brought the issue to light in April of last year.
Prajwal Revanna appealed the Karnataka High Court’s decision to refuse him bail in the rape and sexual abuse case, but the Supreme Court rejected his plea in November 2024.
A bench consisting of Justices Bela M. Trivedi and Satish Chandra Sharma declined to consider Revanna’s request. “Dismissed,” said Justice Trivedi.
Justice Trivedi noted that there are several additional allegations, while senior attorney Mukul Rohatgi, speaking on behalf of Revanna, informed the bench that the Section 376 IPC (rape) offense was not referenced in the complaint.
“You are so powerful,” the bench informed Revanna’s attorney. Former Prime Minister HD Deve Gowda’s grandson is Revanna.
Revanna has appealed the October 21 Karnataka High Court ruling that denied his requests for both regular and anticipatory release.
Following the release of hundreds of obscene movies purportedly showing him with many women, CID’s SIT detained him at the Bengaluru airport on May 31 of last year when he was returning from Germany, where he had been for 35 days.
He was defeated by more than 40,000 votes in the Lok Sabha election.
After several pornographic film clips purportedly showing the sexual abuse of several women appeared on social media last year, Revanna was named as the primary defendant in four criminal proceedings.
The Karnataka Police’s Special Investigation Team (SIT), which is looking into allegations of sexual assault and harassment against Prajwal Revanna, filed a fourth complaint against him in June 2024.
Three of the cases against Prajwal Revanna were filed under the sexual assault section of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), while the fourth case was filed under the sections for sexual harassment, stalking, and criminal intimidation of a victim, as well as for secretly taking and disseminating pictures of the victim.