New Delhi: The DIG of Railway Protection Force, PJ Rawal, who had been accused of trying to outrage the modesty of the wife of an IPS officer on a train on July 8, was chargesheeted by the Government Railway Police on Thursday after an investigation found that the charges against him were true.
Alok Kumar, the investigating officer and officer-in-charge of GRP in Patna, submitted the chargesheet in the court of Railway Judicial Magistrate KK Singh.
Sujata Preyasi, wife of Punjab cadre IPS officer Gautam Cheema, had filed an FIR with the GRP on July 10, alleging that Rawal had tried to outrage her modesty while in an inebriated condition in a coach of the Sampoorna Kranti Express on the night of July 8.
Preyasi was on her way to Patna from Delhi with her daughter and sister Vandana Preyasi, an IAS officer posted as a Joint Secretary in Bihar. The FIR was lodged under Section 354 (assault or criminal force to woman with intent to outrage her modesty) of IPC.
The chargesheet said it was found during investigations that there were serious discrepancies in the information shared by Rawal with RPF Director General MK Sinha immediately after the incident and what he told the GRP later. Rawal is currently posted in Delhi.
"While Rawal told his DG that he accidentally fell on Sujata after his feet got entangled with the luggage of the two sisters, he claimed during interrogation by GRP that nothing of the sort had happened," a source involved in the probe told PTI after the chargesheet was submitted.
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The chargesheet said Rawal had told investigators that Sujata Preyasi, who was criticising the Railways for poor service, got enraged when he switched on his reading light to dispose of a few files that he was carrying during the visit.
In the meantime, Sujata's daughter allegedly tore up a few currency notes belonging to Rawal. Rawal protested against this, sparking an altercation with the two sisters.
The women then summoned the coach attendant and began quarreling with him, Rawal said when he appeared before the GRP for interrogation on July 16, three days after he was arrested at his Delhi office and granted bail.
Moreover, the chargesheet said, the coach attendant and others present on the scene had told the investigators that soon after the incident, Rawal had claimed that the two women had picked up a fight with him as his hand had inadvertently touched that of Sujata's when he was trying to pick up a water bottle.
"If the DIG was innocent, why did he not register a formal complaint on reaching Patna as was done by Sujata? This shows his guilty conscience," the investigating officer said in the chargesheet.
The chargesheet also mentions phone calls made from the train by Sujata and Vandana to their parents during which the sisters asked the parents not to worry as a coach attendant and other train staff had arrived soon after the incident.
The same night, a two-member committee headed by RPF IG Gopal Gupta was constituted to go into the episode and submit a report within a week. It is not yet known if this committee has submitted its report.
(With PTI inputs)
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