Communist Party of India (CPI) State secretary Arvind Shrivastava gave a clarification on the alleged involvement of his party’s State office in the sexual harassment case involving a JNU student while talking to mediapersons here on Sunday.
Shrivastava said, “The party wants to make it clear that the victim is not related to the party and the party office was not involved in the case. The girl is a research scholar and she knew Ashish Raghuvanshi. Once she stayed at the State party office. She also gave the tariff to stay as per the party rules. She did not complain about any kind of harassment during her stay.”
Notably, a sexual harassment case was lodged against Ashish Raghuvanshi by the student. The woman came into contact with Raghuvanshi and later she stayed from December 2015 to June 2016 with the accused in live-in relation. The victim left for Delhi without informing regarding the incident and later she narrated the incident to her family after which a complaint was lodged with the Basantkunj police in Delhi. The case was transferred to Mangalwara police recently and after investigation, the case was registered.
The victim had claimed that she had provided `60,000 to the accused during her stay with him in the city and even after demanding refund she was not provided with the money. After preliminary investigation the police registered a case under section 376 of the IPC and have started further investigation.
Shrivastava said Ashish Raghuvanshi was convener of the Madhya Pradesh unit of the AISF and was expelled from the party in June, 2016 after the victim approached senior members of the AISF. Senior leaders urged her to lodge a police complaint but she refused. But she kept Raghuvanshi and others pressurising for the money.
Shrivastava added that the woman angrily initiated agitation against the party to defame the party. The girl had never complained about harassment before lodging FIR the woman has herself accepted that she was in live-in relationship with Raghuvanshi.
He added the CPI will not tolerate women’s harassment and the CPI demands prompt action in the case.