The Aam Aadmi Party government has found itself at the centre of a storm since Wednesday, when Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal sacked his Minister for Women and Child development Sandeep Kumar, for appearing in a sex tape.
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Ousted Delhi Social Welfare Minister Sandeep Kumar today surrendered before Delhi Police, hours after a complaint of rape was registered against him.
She has alleged that Kumar had offered her a spiked drink and when she fell unconscious, she was taken to his house adjacent to the office and raped. Police had sought 14-day remand for the accused, but the court only agreed for one-day police custody. “Rape charges against my husband are wrong”.
In her complaint filed at Sultanpuri police station, the woman claimed the CD was made after Kumar became minister and that she did not know about it.
Kumar, who is the MLA from Sultanpur Majra, was seen with two women in separate instances in the video act that Kejriwal termed “objectionable”.
He was taken to the court on Sunday.
He said, the matter has been sent to the disciplinary committee and whatever recommendations will come from it, the party will follow. He says the tape was fabricated and part of a political conspiracy to tar his image.
In a sudden move on 31 August, the 36-year-old minister was sacked from the council of ministers by chief minister Arvind Kejriwal after receiving the “objectionable” CD in which he was purportedly shown in a compromising position with a woman. On Thursday, he defended himself, saying he had resigned on his own and alleged that he had been targeted because he was a Dalit.
Congress members on Monday observed a “maun vrat” (silence) at Rajghat to protest against AAP leader Ashutosh’s remarks on Mahatma Gandhi and former PMs Jawaharlal Nehru and Atal Bihari Vajpayee. Senior party leader Ashutosh wrote an impassioned column on the NDTV website defending Kumar, claiming the party’s eagerness to let him go was a reflection of the country’s hypocritical moral standards.
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He said “justifications” put forth by Ashutosh for Kumar’s conduct were not “as per the acceptable value systems”.
