On run since Friday after he was booked in a rape case, the former Akali minister Sucha Singh langah on Wednesday surrendered before Gurdaspur court which sent him to five-day police custody.
A day before, langah had moved the Punjab and Haryana High Court seeking 72-hour anticipatory bail for enabling him to surrender.
The application has now been rendered infructuous in view of his surrender. langah had been on the run even as the Punjab Police had been conducting raids to trace him.
“The court today sent him to five-day police remand after he surrendered before it,” said Gurdaspur Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Harcharan Singh Bhullar, adding that a lookout notice was also issued against the former Minister in order to trace him.
“Investigating officers will now probe the rape charges registered against him,” the SSP said. Police was demanding 10 days remand from the court in the rape case against langah.
Meanwhile, the Court has instructed the police to conduct a medical examination of the accused on a daily basis, as langah has stated in his surrender application that he fears that he might be tortured in the Police custody.
The Punjab Police had been facing flak for not being able to nab him after the case was registered on Friday and also when he came to the Chandigarh District Court complex to file an application for surrender on October 2.
langah was booked by the police on the night of September 28 after a woman gave a complaint that the Akali leader had allegedly been raping her repeatedly since 2009.
The police had booked langah under Sections 376 (rape), 384 (extortion), 420 (cheating) and 506 (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code.
The victim, a widow of a Punjab vigilance official, had also given a video clip in a pen drive to the police to support her accusations.
On October 2, the Chandigarh District Court had rejected the application of langah for surrender in connection with the rape case registered against him by the Gurdaspur police.
langah had dubbed the rape case lodged against him as “false”, and accused a Congress MlA of getting him booked. He had also termed the complaint as a “classic example of political vendetta”.
Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) had accepted the resignation of party core committee member langah from all posts. langah had also resigned from the membership of the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC).