K'taka Cong MLA refutes rape charges; files extortion plaint against woman, media head

Congress MLA and Karnataka Urban Water Supply and Drainage Board President, Vinay Kulkarni on Wednesday refuted charges of rape and kidnapping levelled by a 34-year-old social worker and lodged a counter-complaint against the woman, a media head and others.

Following the complaint by Vinay Kulkarni, Sanjaynagar police in Bengaluru have lodged an FIR against Rakesh Shetty, the owner of a private Kannada news channel and the woman.

Rakesh Shetty has been named as the accused number one and the woman as the second accused in the FIR.

The FIR has been lodged under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita Sections 3 (5), 308 (2), 61 (2).

Vinay Kulkarni has stated that in 2022 the woman from Haveri district was introduced to him.

“She made calls claiming to be a pro-farmer activist. However, there was a programme on a private channel about victims of extortion and after getting to know about the cheating, blackmail cases against her, I had stopped taking her calls,” Vinay Kulkarni stated in his complaint.

“There was no connection with her for two years. Meanwhile, Rakesh Shetty, the woman and others hatched a conspiracy to damage my image by telecasting purported audio and video records. On September 24, Rakesh Shetty called me on my mobile phone and told me that he would telecast a news report about me making a video call to a woman,” he told the police.

“He had also sent promos posted on the Facebook and YouTube channel of his media house and threatened that if I did not give Rs 2 crore, my political career would be destroyed,” Vinay Kulkarni has stated in the complaint to the police.

He added that he told Rakesh Shetty that he would take legal action and obtain a stay on the telecast of the news, however, Rakesh Shetty stated that he would not care for the court’s order and would go ahead and telecast the news if the money demanded by him was not given.

“When I refused to give money, the news was telecast, using my photograph and purported video and audio conversations,” the MLA stated.

Karnataka police have booked an FIR against the MLA from Dharwad constituency for raping, kidnapping and threatening the social worker.

Sanjaynagar police in Bengaluru booked the FIR against Vinay Kulkarni, who is out on bail in a murder case of a BJP leader.

The police have booked him under Section 67 of the Information Technology Act. The MLA has also been booked under the Sections 506 (criminal intimidation), 504 (intentional insult), 201 (destruction or concealment of evidence), 366 (kidnapping), 376 (rape), 323 (voluntarily causing hurt), 354 (use of criminal force against woman with intent to outrage her modesty) of the IPC.

The complainant had stated that the incident had taken place between January 1, 2022 and October 3, 2022.

Vinay Kulkarni has been named as the accused number one and his associate Arjun is named as the second accused in the FIR.