New Delhi: The Delhi Police told the Rouse Avenue Court on Friday, August 11, that there is enough evidence against the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP and Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) former chief, Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh, for him to be put on trial in the sexual harassment case filed by women wrestlers.

The court of Harjeet Singh Jaspal, Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate, was hearing the matter to decide if charges need to be framed against Singh.

Public prosecutor Atul Srivastava urged the court to frame the charges against Singh and also against co-accused Vinod Tomar in relation to offences mentioned in the Delhi Police's chargesheet, The Hindu reported.

The 1,000-page chargesheet accuses Singh of offences under Sections 354 (assault or criminal force to woman with intent to outrage her modesty), 354A (sexual harassment), and 354D (stalking) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). The chargesheet was filed on June 15.

Srivastava dismissed the submissions to the court by Singh's counsel, Rajiv Mohan, by calling them "not meritorious". Mohan had told the court that "hugging or touching a woman without sexual intent is not an offence", and that he only hugged the wrestlers as he took pride in their performance.

"They were someone he knew for many years and have mentored them. Winning a medal was a moment of pride for the country and that hug was just an expression of his happiness. This is why we maintain that he had no intent of sexual harassment," Mohan had said in defence of Singh.

Srivastava also objected to Mohan's submission that a Delhi court does not have territorial jurisdiction for offences committed outside India. The latter had pointed out that the alleged offences by Singh – as mentioned in the charge sheet – took place outside India, in Mongolia in 2016, in Indonesia in 2018, and in Kazakhstan in 2019. He had also argued that for a Delhi court to try such offences, prior approval from the Union government should have been taken, which he said, was not obtained.

The public prosecutor argued that the court will have jurisdiction to put Singh on trial as the offences in question were partly committed in Delhi. Referring to the Supreme Court’s judgement in Sartaj Khan vs the State of Uttarakhand following a criminal appeal filed in 2018, the public prosecutor submitted in the court "....qua submissions made by the defence in reference to Section 188 of the CrPC, it is submitted that the bar of Section 188 is applicable when the offence is committed outside India in its entirety and not otherwise", the newspaper reported.

He then went on to point out that since the matter fell under Section 354 (assault or criminal force to a woman with intent to outrage her modesty) of the IPC, with recourse to Section 468(3) of the CrPC, there can be no questions on the bar of limitation as submitted by the defence counsel.

The particular section of the CrPC deals with the period of limitation in relation to offences which may be tried together, which shall be determined with reference to the offence which is punishable with the more severe punishment or, as the case may be, the most severe punishment.

Srivastava also argued that the report of the oversight committee of WFI which exonerated Singh does not bar the jurisdiction of the court to try him. He said called it a mere departmental enquiry, adding that the court is duty-bound to only study the material on record in the strict brackets of prima facie scrutiny and a mini-trial cannot be conducted at this stage.

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