On Tuesday, the Supreme Court has allowed anticipatory bail for prominent Malayalam actor Siddique real name Siddique Kuthirakkal in a Rape complaint filed by an actress against him. A bench comprising Justices Bela Trivedi and Satish Chandra Sharma made the interim anticipatory bail, granted on September 30, permanent.
The top court, however, directed the actor to cooperate with the investigation and surrender his passport to the investigating officer.
The allegations against Siddique in question came in the midst of numerous allegations of sexual impropriety in the Malayalam film industry following the release of the Justice K Hema Committee report in August. The report speaks of mass sexual harassment as well as gender discrimination in the industry.
During the hearing, the top court asked the complainant why it took eight years to file a complaint against Siddique. The court recognized that the complainant also accused 13 other persons, via a post on Facebook, of sexual abuse in the same way during the year 2018.
The Supreme Court remarked, “In view of the fact that the present complainant registered the complaint 8 years after the incident of 2016, and had also pursued a Facebook post in 2018, accusing 14 individuals, including the appellant, of sexual abuse, which included the appellant. And because she had not presented any evidence before the Hema Committee… Therefore we are inclined to allow the present appeal with certain conditions.”
In her complaint, the actress stated that Siddique raped her at the Mascot Hotel in Thiruvananthapuram in 2016.
Advocate Vrinda Grover appearing for the complainant submitted that the rape survivor could muster the courage to file a complaint only because the Hema committee and the Kerala high court reached out to them and took note of the situation.
why was she silent? you can see through the facebook posts an attempt to tyalk about it.
“Was there a reason for her there to be no reaction? One can clearly see through the Facebook posts, that she is trying to reach out about it. And there are a few comments on social media courtesy the followers of his (Siddique)… The trial will be compromised if he is not questioned – Grover argued.
Yet another senior counsel Mukul Rohatgi on behalf of Siddique claimed that the defendant had done no way wrong and the complainant’s charges looked dubious.
“It appears that all and everyone are victims of her allegations of sexual assault. Is that even possible? Check one her posts on her Facebook. This is how people’s reputations are destroyed.” said Rohatgi.
The state counsel from Kerala, crisply stated that there was lack of cooperation from the side of Siddique. He requested the court to order that the trial court allow public prosecutor’s submissions to be made before fixing any bail conditions. The higher court dismissed the application.”
