#MenToo: Actor Karan Oberoi seeks effective probe of rape accuser in ‘staged’ attack

MUMBAI: Actor

Karan Oberoi

’s lawyer on Tuesday shot off a letter to

Oshiwara police

to “immediately carry out investigation as effectively as possible’’ into the attack that his rape accuser allegedly staged on herself last month. The letter said that if police fail to probe the case effectively, Oberoi has kept the “options open to prosecute you (police) for having committed the offence of shielding the accused”.


The letter, written on instructions of the actor, expresses concern over police not questioning his accuser even 10 days after she was accused of having staged her own assault and four days after the Bombay high court reprimanded police while granting bail to Oberoi.

“Despite clear cut directions of the high court” to take legal action against the woman for filing a “false case’’, the letter said, the police made an “extraordinary delay of three days in seizing her mobile phones”. The woman who had first filed an FIR against Oberoi on May 4 for repeated rape, later filed an FIR on May 25 for an assault on her to threaten her to withdraw her rape FIR. In the HC, the prosecutor said her second FIR was a “fake’’ case “filed at her behest”.

The actor is out on bail after being in judicial custody for over a month. Police have apparently not recorded her statement for reasons best known to them, said the letter, adding, “no thorough investigation is being carried out so as to not only expose the first informant but also to collect all possible evidence against her for having indulged criminal conspiracy for filing false FIR.”

The lawyer also highlighted the importance of seizing her phones at the earliest to rule out the possibility of distortion or manipulation of data. Her phones were submitted to police three days after the HC order.

He also requested the police to “collect evidence so as to bring on record the meeting place of the accused where conspiracy was supposed to have been hatched”.

Earlier also, the lawyer had on June 6 written a letter to police delivered to them a day after the bail order questioning the police for its tardy approach to the probe against the woman for her second “false” FIR. The letter said: “It is also expected that you would collect independent material, barring the statement of co-accused against each other, so as to show that all the accused hatched conspiracy with each other’s involvement and the nature of communications well as specimen handwriting to ascertain handwriting on the chit allegedly thrown at her.”

There is a

Bombay HC

judgment clearly holding that CCTV recording of a police Station is required to be maintained for a period of one year, he pointed out seeking that footage from the police station be preserved since early May.

The actor’s lawyer Dinesh Tiwari also placed on record with police that he and Oberoi’s sister had on May 8, after the actor’s arrest, met the officer at Oshiwara police station pointing out that that allegations of rape are false and “requested that the entire communication between the First Informant and the my client either by way of e-mails, Whatsapp Communication, SMSs or any other method be taken on record.’’ “You both ... refused to look into the suggestion given by us,’’ said the letter to the senior police inspector and the investigating officer.

It also said he had “already highlighted’’ that Oberoi’s laptop and mobile phone were taken charge not on the date recorded by police but earlier. “In other words, it’s apparent that the documents have been manipulated for the purpose of making false allegations to the extent of recovery of the mobile phone and the Laptop.’’ Their can be seen on the police station CCTV recording, which must be preserved, he said.

It’s preposterous woman hasn’t been questioned yet, says senior lawyer

Senior crime counsel Niteen Pradhan says “when the Bombay high court has directed police to take appropriate directions and if police have said that the second FIR filed by the woman of an attack on her, is false, then not questioning her for so long is not just questionable but also preposterous.’’

He added that the police have a duty to conduct a proper and fair probe into the FIR and cannot be seen to be abdicating in any part of its duties. During Karan Oberoi’s bail hearing in the Bombay high court, Justice Revati Mohite Dere repeatedly told the police “you are expected to do a free, fair and impartial investigation”.