NEW DELHI: A Delhi court on Tuesday allowed an interim bail to BJP MP and former WFI chief Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh in a case of alleged sexual harassment lodged by women wrestlers.
Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Harjeet Singh Jaspal granted interim bail after noting that the prosecution has not arrested the accused during the investigation of the matter.
Advocate Rajeev Mohan appeared for Singh, while prosecutor Atul Shrivastava represented the State.
The court put the matter for hearing regular bail on Thursday.
On July 7, the court sought personal appearance of Brij Bhushan before it, while taking cognisance of the chargesheet filed against him.
It had also issued summons against Vinod Tomar, suspended assistant secretary of the Wrestling Federation of India. He was also granted interim bail till Thursday.
Delhi police had filed a chargesheet against Brij Bhushan, a six-time MP, on June 15 under Sections 354 (assault or criminal force to woman with intent to outrage her modesty), 354A (sexual harassment), 354D (stalking) and 506 (criminal intimidation) of the IPC.
Tomar was named as accused of offences under Sections 109 (abetment of any offence, if the act abetted is committed in consequence, and where no express provision is made for its punishment), 354, 354A and 506 (criminal intimidation) of the IPC.
On May 4, the Supreme Court had closed the proceedings on a plea filed by women wrestlers alleging sexual harrasment against Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) president Singh, as the FIRs were lodged on their complaint and security has been provided to the athletes.
Two FIRs, including one under Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POCSO), were lodged against Singh by the Delhi police on April 28. However, the police filed a closure report in the case filed on the minor's complaint after she reportedly retracted from her statement made before a judicial magistrate.
Olympian wrestlers Bajrang Punia, Sakshi Malik, Vinesh Phogat and other grapplers, most of whom hailed from Haryana, demanded removal of Singh as WFI chief and his arrest and organised over month-long agitation against him.
