Fourth FIR filed against Prajwal Revanna for sexual harassment; former BJP MLA Preetham Gowda also named

Three others, including former BJP MLA from Hassan Preetham Gowda, have also been named in the First Information Report (FIR). Police sources said Preetham Gowda, Kiran, and Sharath have been accused of sharing images that Prajwal Revanna recorded in the course of sexual harassment of a victim on a video call.

The victim filed a complaint stating the recording of the sexual harassment by Prajwal Revanna and the sharing of the clip by others caused embarrassment and loss of image for her whole family in Hassan.

On Monday, the SIT sought a body warrant for the custody of Prajwal Revanna to probe the fourth case filed against the former MP. The request for a body warrant in the case registered 10 days ago was submitted in the court even as Prajwal Revanna was sent to judicial custody for 14 days at the end of five days of police custody in the third sexual assault case filed against him since April 28.

The SIT has conducted custodial investigations against Prajwal Revanna for 21 days in the three sexual assault cases and has now sought custody for probing the fourth case. The fourth case involves a video call made by the MP to a victim where he is alleged to have sexually harassed her during the call.

The recording of the incident was among more than 2,900 clips found on the mobile phones of the former MP which were leaked into the public domain allegedly by political rivals ahead of the April 26 Lok Sabha elections for the Hassan seat, where Prajwal Revanna was defeated.

Cases against Prajwal Revanna

The fourth FIR has been registered under IPC sections 354(A),354(D),354(B), 506, and 66 E of the Information Technology Act.

In the first case registered on April 28, Prajwal Revanna and his father H D Revanna, the son of the former prime minister H D Deve Gowda, were initially accused of sexual harassment of a woman who worked at the Revanna family home in Hassan. Later, charges of rape were invoked against Prajwal Revanna in this case.

A second case of rape was registered on May 1 based on a complaint by a former Zilla Panchayat member in Hassan who accused the MP of sexually assaulting her for over three years and recording videos of the act, which he would use to threaten and blackmail her.

The third FIR was filed on May 8 where Prajwal Revanna was accused of rape by a woman who was employed at the home of his family. The SIT registered the FIR after the woman was rescued on May 5 from a farmhouse near Mysuru where she was allegedly kept by H D Revanna and his associates. The victim told the police she was attacked by Prajwal Revanna when she worked for his family for six years.

Prajwal Revanna is accused of repeatedly carrying out sexual attacks on his victims (IPC section 376 (2) (n)) in two cases and the third FIR accuses the JD(S) leader of committing rape on a woman while “being in a position of control or dominance” over the woman.

Rape charges against Prajwal Revanna emerged at the end of April following the leak of explicit videos and images through pen drives distributed in Hassan. He flew to Europe on April 27, and was arrested at the Bengaluru airport after he returned on May 31.

The SIT has been constituted by the Karnataka Government to probe the sexual assault videos that were allegedly accessed from the MP’s phone by a car driver and leaked to political rivals of the MP.