The Hindu : New Delhi News : Sex scandal case: plea dismissed

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Wednesday, Apr 16, 2008
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Sex scandal case: plea dismissed

Appeal against acquittals in ice-cream parlour case

K. Ajitha had filed the petition

Government’s plea was dismissed earlier

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Tuesday dismissed a petition filed by the complainant in the ice-cream parlour sex scandal that challenged the High Court verdict acquitting all the 16 accused in the case.

A Bench, headed by Justices B.N. Agrawal and G.S. Singhvi, declined to interfere with the Kerala High Court judgment upholding the trial court verdict in the case.

The scandal had rocked the State in 1996 with prosecution alleging that one Sreedevi was running a brothel from an ice-cream parlour. It was alleged that the lady used to supply girls to various influential people, including politicians.

The complainant K. Ajitha had submitted in her petition that though there were 51 prosecution witnesses in the case, all others except her had turned hostile as the accused were influential and used money and muscle power to coerce them.

Ms. Ajitha, who represents an NGO, Anweshi Women’s Counselling Centre, through her counsel Aparna Bhat, submitted that the trial court had acquitted all the accused without appreciating the facts; and the High Court also upheld the acquittal without bothering to examine as to why such a large number of witnesses turned hostile.

The apex court found no merit in the appeal as it had already dismissed the State government’s plea on the issue. It had in February this year dismissed a similar petition filed by the State government challenging the acquittal.

The accused in the case included former Mayors of the Kozhikode Corporation T.P. Dasan and O. Rajagopal.

Aravindakshan, driver of IUML general secretary P.K. Kunhalikutty was also an accused. — PTI

‘Unfortunate’

Staff Reporter writes from Kozhikode:

Anweshi Women’s Counselling Centre president K. Ajitha and secretary V.R. Anita has termed the Supreme Court’s dismissal of the ice-cream parlour case as “unfortunate.”

In a statement here on Tuesday, Ms. Ajitha said the court had refused time for argument on the government appeal for reopening the case, leading to the dismissal of the petition filed by her.

Anweshi alleged that from the very beginning, a conspiracy had been hatched to destroy all the evidence on the case.

This was because the guilty were persons in politics and the administration.

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