Victim girl fears for life from bigwigs who could be exposed

The minor victim of a sexual harassment case involving a leading automobile dealer Nikhil Priyadarshi, fears that she might be eliminated to close the case, as it had the potential to implicate and damage many bigwigs in the corridors of power.

The first impact of her damaging allegations was seen when Brajesh Pandey, a vice president of the Bihar Pradesh Congress Committee (BPCC), whom the girl had accused as being one of the tormentors resigned from his post on Tuesday. Pandey also quit as the chairperson of the programme implementation committee of the party against demonetisation. He said the entire episode was a ‘political conspiracy’ to defame him. Police have already issued an arrest order after including him in the supervision note of the case.

BPCC spokesperson Harkhu Jha said Pandey’s resignation had been accepted.

The girl, however, is not hopeful of the case making much headway.

“I don’t see any substantial progress taking place in the case. I found courage only after chief minister Nitish Kumar’s assurance of quick action,” she told HT on Tuesday, adding that she had met him last week at his residence. 

The girl, daughter of a senior Congress leader, said she had met many top officials for justice over the last two months, but to no avail, as not a single person had been arrested so far.

“If I don’t get justice, I will be left with no option but to commit self-immolation, as there is no point living like this. I have pulled myself out of depression and overcome the suicidal tendencies that gripped me. When my family members, several officials and a vast number of friends counselled me to be brave and fight, I gathered courage and filed a case. Now, I am losing hope again. I don’t know, if the case can be concluded and the perpetrators be booked ever,” she said. 

The girl claimed that she was lured by Priyadarshi, who promised marriage, but later realised that he, along with others, was running a sex racket. 

“The relationship initially was in good faith, as Nikhil introduced me to his family. Later, he also had physical relations with me. But after that he started exploiting and threatening me, saying he had video clips of mine. He introduced Brajesh Pandey, a senior Congress leader, to me as ‘mantriji’. Besides, he’d call many senior IPS officials and other bureaucrats as ‘bhaiya’ while talking with them over phone,” she said. 

The girl said she is not the lone one to have been exploited by Nikhil. “There are many others, but they may not be able to come out in public like me and lodge protest. I had requested the police to look into Priyadarshi’s e-mails, which, I am sure, will help identify many of the bigwigs and his sordid connections. My fight is for all those women and girls who have been tormented by him,” she added, recalling how he took her to a flat off Boring Road and on Durga Marine drive on Ashok Rajpath to introduce her to his ‘friends’. 

The victim said she would have come out earlier with the details had Priyadarshi not threatened to make her video clips public. “He was in the business of supplying girls to many powerful people of Patna,” she alleged. 

She said she was tortured and humiliated on one occasion when she refused to accompany Nikhil to New Delhi. “He often said he has high-level contacts and even police won’t be able to do anything to him. His clout became evident when I had to do a lot of running around to get even an FIR lodged,” she added. 

Meanwhile, DSP women’s cell, Mamata Kalyani directed the investigating officer in the case to track the culprits and put them under arrest immediately.