Team Herald
PANJIM: Activist Tara Kerkar has demanded that the case of sexual harassment registered against lawyer-activist Aires Rodrigues and the counter complaint be handed over to Crime Branch (CB) for an impartial probe.
Kerkar has also demanded suspension of the police officials, who have showed favouritism towards Rodrigues during the ongoing investigation.
“After the questioning at Anjuna Police Station, a policeman dropped Rodrigues in a vehicle near the highway. Similarly, at Old Goa Police Station where the ‘blackmailer’ (Rodrigues) had filed a counter complaint against the victim woman, he was given special treatment. I have proof that police constable in civil clothes took him to the Goa Medical College for examination. I don’t trust the police investigation, the cases should be handed over to CB,” the NGO Savera President told a press conference on Sunday.
Rodrigues is booked under Sections 354 (A) (iv)(sexual harassment), 509 (words or gesture to insult modesty of a woman), 500 (defamation) of Indian Penal Code based on a woman’s complaint lodged at Anjuna Police Station accusing him of circulating on Facebook and Whatsapp an alleged video footage linking her with Water Resources Minister Vinod Palyekar.
Rodrigues later lodged a counter complaint at Old Goa Police Station against the victim, her husband and two unknown men ‘for forming an unlawful assembly, criminally trespassing into his office.
, assaulting him after having threatened and abused him with dire consequences besides throwing an ink bottle on his body.’
