MP honeytrap: Court denies bail to woman

New Delhi: A special court has denied bail to a woman  accused of organising a honeytrap and blackmailing BJP MP K.C. Pate. The court said she had adopted “ingenious modus operandi” to trap  public personalities and extort money. The court also dismissed the bail plea of businessman Ajay Kumar  alias Ajay Pal Chauhan, who along with the 40- year-old woman, is  lodged in judicial custody saying they were “partners in crime.” 

Special Judge Hemani Malhotra said the material prima facie suggested  that the woman adopted this “ingenious modus operandi to trap public  personalities by accusing them of rape/molestation and then extort money from them”.

“This kind of act is not only diabolical but also brings loss of  reputation and stigma to the persons accused of rape/molestation. Such persons are repeatedly shunned by their own families and public at large, irrespective of the ultimate result. It is not a simple case of extortion in which case, the victim suffers pecuniary loss.

The present case is an instance where the  victims suffer loss of honour and fall in the eyes of society,” the  court observed. According to the prosecution, the woman had allegedly filmed obscene  videos of the Gujarat’s Valsad MP after drugging him and threatened to make them public if she was not paid Rs 7 crore. Chauhan had allegedly helped the woman in executing the offence.

The court considered the gravity of offence and dismissed the bail  pleas. “On the basis of the admitted fact that accused Ajay Kumar alias  Ajay Pal had made payment for installing hidden cameras in the flat of accused woman and the call detail records, it prima facie appears that both the accused persons were in conspiracy with each other  and were partners in crime,” the court said.