Former Ernakulam Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate(Economic Offences) N.V. Raju, who has been issued a memo of charge by the High Court for having committed procedural lapses in recording the statement of solar scam accused Saritha S. Nair when she was produced before him, deposed before the G. Sivarajan Judicial Inquiry Commission on Friday that Saritha had stated that she was sexually abused.
He told the commission that it was on July 20, 2013 Saritha and Biju Radhakrishnan (another accused) were produced before the Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate (Economic Offence) after five days of police custody in six solar scam cheating cases. When asked whether they had any complaint against the police, Biju said that he did not have any complaint. Saritha did not say anything.
When she submitted that she was sexually harassed, he had asked her whether she had any complaint of being raped, to which she gave an affirmative answer. Then he had asked her to submit a written complaint through her advocate.
When Mr. Raju started writing down the notes of proceeding, she started speaking about some financial dealing and names of some persons about whom he had never heard before.
Since it was about the facts of the case, he did not note down what she was submitting. She had also said that there were threats to her life. So, he had directed the Kochi City Police Commissioner to look into her complaint, he told the commission.
Ex-Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate deposes before commission