New Delhi/Lucknow: BJP lawmaker Kuldeep Singh Sengar, accused of raping a 16-year-old girl last year, has been arrested by the Central Bureau of Investigation or CBI on Friday evening. The arrest comes hours after the Allahabad High Court ordered the probe agency to immediately arrest the lawmaker and severely reprimanded the Yogi Adityanath government.
A bench of Chief Justice DB Bhosale and Justice Suneet Kumar gave the direction to the agency after the counsel for the Uttar Pradesh government informed it that Sengar has been detained for interrogation and not arrested yet.
It directed CBI to arrest "forthwith" Sengar and the other accused named in the FIR registered on Thursday for offences punishable under sections 363, 366, 376, 506 of IPC and sections 3 and 4 of POCSO Act and carry out further investigation within the time stipulated under the provisions of CrPC.
It also directed the agency to file a status report by May 2.
The judges also took strong objection to Advocate General Raghvendra Singh's submission that Sengar would not be arrested on mere registration of the FIR, saying, "The approach of the learned Advocate General is not only appalling but shocks the conscience of the Court in the backdrop of the instant case."
The bench passed the order on a letter written by senior advocate Gopal Swaroop Chaturvedi demanding a court-monitored investigation of the incident and treated it as a PIL.
The notice to the CBI to take over the Unnao case was issued on Thursday night, following which the probe agency in a matter of a few hours picked up the BJP legislator from his Lucknow home at 4:30 am.
In another development, the Supreme Court (SC) said on Friday it has decided to examine, of its own accord, the Kathua gangrape-murder case, and has also sent a notice to the Bar Council of Jammu and Kashmir for preventing the filing of a charge sheet against the rape accused.
The SC also took serious note of the Kathua District Bar Association and the High Court Bar Association at Jammu striking work and opposing the filing of the charge sheet in the rape case, and obstructing a lawyer from representing the victim's family. It issued notices to these two associations as well.
An SC bench headed by Chief Justice Dipak Misra sought answers from all the people it issued notices to by April 19 and said it is impermissible under law and ethics to prevent the filing of a charge sheet or oppose the representation of the victim's family by a lawyer.
The SC bench said every party before any court is entitled to engage a lawyer and if advocates oppose this principle, then it would be destructive of justice dispensation system. Earlier on Thursday, a clutch of lawyers who practice in the SC, requested a bench of Chief Justice Dipak Misra and Justices A M Khanwilkar and D Y Chandrachud to take suo moto cognisance of the horrific incident. The lawyers said they would put together the facts of the case in writing for the SC. See P5