The Madras High Court on Monday, February 12, 2024, refused to stay the operation of a judgement passed by the Villupuram Principal Sessions Court earlier during the day, upholding the conviction and three-year sentence imposed on former special Director General of Police (DGP) Rajesh Das in a case relating to the sexual harassment of a woman Superintendent of Police (SP), while on duty, in February 2021.
The sexual harassment incident took place Mr. Das and the woman officer were part of security arrangements for then Chief Minister, Edappadi K. Palaniswami, during an election campaign.
The Villupuram Principal Sessions Court had confirmed the three-year sentence imposed by a lower court on Das in the case. The Principal District Judge R. Poornima passed the verdict while dismissing the appeal filed by Mr. Das.
Justice M. Nirmal Kumar of the High Court pointed out that the verdict could be stayed only if the convict challenged the Sessions Court verdict, not through a criminal revision petition in which he had insisted on transferring his criminal appeal to the newly-inaugurated Principal Sessions Court in Kallakurichi district.
When the criminal revision petition was listed for hearing before the judge on Monday, he was informed that the Villupuram Principal Sessions Court had delivered the judgement on the appeal that morning. Though the counsel pleaded for a stay, the judge refused to pass any such order. He simply ordered notice to the State on the revision plea and adjourned the matter to February 27.
In his revision petition, Mr. Das had pointed out that his previous plea to transfer the hearing of the appeal from the Villupuram Principal Sessions Court to any other court was rejected by the High Court on January 9, 2024.
Thereafter, the Supreme Court too, dismissed his appeal on January 23, 2024. Subsequently, a Principal District and Sessions Court for Kallakurichi, a new district created through bifurcation of Villupuram, was inaugurated on January 25, 2024 and therefore, the appeal ought to have been transferred there, he claimed.
However, since the Villupuram Principal Sessions Court delivered its verdict even before the revision could be taken up for hearing on Monday, Justice Kumar stopped with ordering notice to the prosecution on the revision plea.
Mr. Das was convicted on June 16, 2023, after a trial, by the Chief Judicial Magistrate court in Villupuram, to three years of RI under Section 4 of the Tamil Nadu Prohibition of Harassment of Woman (Amendment) Act, 2002. He was also imposed with a fine of ₹10,000. For the offence under Section 341, read with Section 109, of the IPC, he was sentenced to pay a fine of ₹500.
The Chief Judicial Magistrate also found former Chengalapattu Superintendent of Police D. Kannan guilty of stopping the woman police officer while she was proceeding to Chennai to file a complaint against Mr. Das. The judge imposed a fine of ₹500 on him.
Challenging the conviction, the duo had filed the present appeal.
