Pollachi Sexual Assault Case: Two Lawyers Move SC For Court-Monitored Probe

Two advocates, both native of Tamil Nadu, today moved the Supreme Court seeking a court-monitored probe into the Pollachi serial sexual assault case and direction to the State and its police to provide necessary safeguard to the victim and their families and to ensure that the videos of the victims shot by the accused are not made public.

A Rajarajan and Y William Vinoth Kumar, who are practicing in Delhi, moved the court saying, "the investigation be monitored by this Hon'ble Court as the entire scandal seems to have been done with political nexus and the victims have already suffered a barbaric sexual assault…"

In light of the fact that the family of one of the victims, a 19-year-old collegegoer, was also assaulted by the gang involved in serial sexual assault of hundreds of women and her identity was revealed, the petitioners prayed that investigation be monitored by the apex court so as to "create a conducive atmosphere for the suspected victims to come out and give their complaint; To keep the identity of the suspected victims under secrecy and to restrain media trails and to restrain online publishing of victims videos, if any, possessed by any individual".

They have also sought directions to the Director General of Police to initiate a departmental enquiry against the R.Pandiarajan Coimbatore Rural Superintendent of Police for revealing the identity of the victim.

The petition also seeks transfer of all related cases outside Tamil Nadu.

The petitioners say "they were completely shocked to hear about news of sexual assault of a college student from Pollachi town and a wider network that is suspected to operate such crimes on a regular basis, comprising politically-connected men".

Relying on media reports about the police attempting to confine the probe to the case of that of the 19-year-old victim, the petitioners said, "the said act of revealing the identity of the victim and their family member and confining the investigation only into the case in hand is nothing but intentional act with ulterior motivesi.e.to discourage the yet to be identified victims of the sex mafia to come out and air their grievance".

The Pollachi serial sexual assault and blackmail case relates to a gang of four men befriending hundreds of women on social media and then sexually molesting them including shooting offending videos and then blackmailing them.

The gang is said to be engaged in such illegal acts since 2013. The case now stands transferred to CBI.