Rahul Pasupalan and his wife model Rasmi R Nair, chief organisers of last year’s Kiss of love protests against moral policing, who were arrested for running an extensive online sex racket, have admitted that they had been misusing the fame the movement had given them for promoting the evil business, according to the Kerala Police.
Rahul and Rasmi had been running the online sex racket for the past several years and the latter had “supplied” minor girls, mostly from other States, to ‘clients’ at several places in the State, police sources said, even as Rahul’s father Pasupalan told the media that he was forced to leave his house after the troubles his son and daughter-in-law gave him became unbearable.
A police team headed by Inspector General (Crime Branch) S Sreejith had arrested the young couple, who had shot to fame through the Kiss of love programmes hosted in several Kerala centres last year as a form of protest against moral policing and so-called cultural fascism, along with ten others on Tuesday through Operation Big Daddy, a two-day State-wide raid.
The police have identified a Kasaragod-based gangster, Abdulkhader Afsal alias Akbar, as the chief operator of the sex racket which has roots in Kerala as well as in Gulf countries, in which Rahul and Rasmi were vital links. The police have concluded that Rasmi was the main “dealer” here in Kerala.
Akbar, arrested along with the young couple, told the police that Rahul and Rasmi were made part of the racket after the former contacted him over the phone expressing desire to be part of the racket. This had happened seven months ago and before that the couple had been operating independently, the police said.
According to the police, Rahul and Rasmi have admitted that they had been using the fame they had derived through Kiss of love for extracting bigger amounts for their “services” from the “clients”. It is said that Rasmi used to demand up to 1`150,000 for minor girls. She had also been cashing in on her fame as the first bikini model of Kerala, the police said.
The Karnataka Police are most likely to join the Kerala Police’s investigation into the online sex racket as it is apparent that girls were being trafficked from Bangalore. Sources said that the Bangalore police had already contacted IGP Sreejith. Identities of more persons linked to the racket could come out after a scientific examination of Rahul’s laptop.
Several other organisers and activists of the Kiss of love on Friday said the arrest of Rahul and Rasmi had in no way reduced the relevance of the politics put forward by the movement. “There were no formal organisers or followers for the movement. It was a response to moral policing and acts of cultural fascism,” an organiser told newsmen in Kochi.