Even as India hockey team skipper Sardar Singh denied allegations of sexual harassment levelled against him, the complainant Sunday said she had proof to back her claims.
Speaking to The Indian Express over phone from the UK, the 21-year-old complainant said, “I have read and heard all what he is saying to the media. How can he deny that we never lived together? I would like to remind him that I am not illiterate. I have all the proofs, including that of my abortion last year. Even his teammates are well aware of our relationship,” she said.
“I am a well-settled professional in the UK. I have no interest in Sardar’s money or fame that he enjoys in India. I am here to get justice and if police fails to lodge an FIR on my complaint, I will move the court,” she said.
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She added that she will move to India once the FIR is filed.
“The proofs I have are enough to register an FIR on charges of rape and fraud against him. It is an extremely bold step on behalf of a 21-year old woman like me to fly down to India alone and submit complaint against a man who is a celebrity. I have done this because I have proof. Sardar can lie to all but not himself,” she said to The Indian Express.
Meanwhile, the special investigation team (SIT) headed by ADCP-4 Satvir Singh Atwal began investigation into the charges Sunday. The complainant has been summoned Monday to record a detailed statement. “Sardar will be summoned complainant’s statement,” said Atwal.
Divya Goyal is a Principal Correspondent with The Indian Express, based in Punjab.
Her interest lies in exploring both news and feature stories, with an effort to reflect human interest at the heart of each piece. She writes on gender issues, education, politics, Sikh diaspora, heritage, the Partition among other subjects. She has also extensively covered issues of minority communities in Pakistan and Afghanistan. She also explores the legacy of India's partition and distinct stories from both West and East Punjab.
She is a gold medalist from the Indian Institute of Mass Communication (IIMC), Delhi, the most revered government institute for media studies in India, from where she pursued English Journalism (Print). Her research work on “Role of micro-blogging platform Twitter in content generation in newspapers” had won accolades at IIMC.
She had started her career in print journalism with Hindustan Times before switching to The Indian Express in 2012.
Her investigative report in 2019 on gender disparity while treating women drug addicts in Punjab won her the Laadli Media Award for Gender Sensitivity in 2020. She won another Laadli for her ground report on the struggle of two girls who ride a boat to reach their school in the border village of Punjab.
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