SUMAN K SHRIVASTAVA
Ranchi, Oct. 5: A Special (CBI) court today sentenced former Registrar (Vigilance) of the Jharkhand High Court, Mushtaq Ahmed, to 15 years imprisonment, Ranjit Singh Kohli alias Raqibul Hasan to life imprisonment and his mother Kaushal Rani to 10 years imprisonment.
Apart from this, a fine of Rs 50,000 has also been imposed on each of them.
The punishment was pronounced by the court of Special Judge PK Sharma on Thursday in a ‘love jihad’ case filed by ace national shooter Tara Shahdeo some nine years ago.
Ranjit Kohli alias Raqibul Hasan, Mushtaq Ahmed, and Kaushal Rani were accused of assaulting Tara Shahdeo, torturing her for religious conversion, and molesting her as part of a well-planned conspiracy, which has now been proved after the court’s decision.
Notably, the court convicted them on September 30, after finding them guilty on various charges, took them into judicial custody, and sent them to Birsa Munda Central Jail Hotwar.
The court has sentenced the accused Ranjit Singh Kohli on charges including repeatedly raping the same woman. Whereas Mushtaq Ahmed and Kaushal Rani have been sentenced for the crime of conspiring to repeatedly rape a woman and others.
CBI’s senior public prosecutor Priyanshu Singh had demanded the harshest punishment during the hearing. Whereas the defense had requested leniency in the punishment.
Notably, Ranjit Kohli and Tara Shahdeo were fraudulently married on July 7, 2014. Incidents of assault and harassment started happening after marriage. An FIR was registered at Hindpiri police station regarding the incident.
Who is guilty under which section
The court has found all three guilty under different sections. All three have also been booked under sections 120B (criminal conspiracy) read with 376(2)(n) (conspiracy to repeatedly rape the same woman), 298 (hurting religious sentiments), 323 (assault), 496 (coercion). Raqibul has been found guilty under section 506 (abusing or fornicating in marriage). He has been acquitted of the charges of dowry harassment and outraging the modesty of a woman.
What are the allegations?
In this case, the Delhi branch of CBI, after completing the investigation, had filed a charge sheet on May 12, 2017, against Tara’s so-called husband Ranjit Kohli alias Raqibul Hasan, mother-in-law Kaushal Rani and Mushtaq Ahmed under relevant sections of the Indian Penal Code. The case was investigated by DSP Seema Pahunja of the CBI Delhi branch. The CBI charge sheet states that Kohli, Kaushal, and Ahmed forced Tara to convert to religion immediately after the marriage. Raqibul tortured her for dowry. Tara alleged that Ranjit had hidden his religion before marriage. Later she was harassed and forced to change her religion. Ahmed is accused of pressuring Tara’s family to marry Raqibul. After marriage, Ahmed brought an Islamic book.
The Case
Tara married a shooting professional named Ranjit Kumar Kohli on July 7 2014 in Ranchi. Ranjit was well-connected with high-profile people. Tara had met Ranjit the same year earlier during shooting practice. He started courting her and later proposed to her, to which she agreed and married Ranjit in June 2014, at a high-end hotel in the capital.
However, subsequently, she walked out alleging that Ranjit was actually one Raqibul, leading to uproar and registration of FIR against him.
Due to this reason, this incident was reported as a possible case of ‘Love Jihad’ back in 2014.
Apart from Raqibul alias Kohli, there were two other accused in the case – Mushtaq Ahmed, an officer in the Jharkhand High Court, and Kohli’s mother, Kaushal Rani. Ahmed was accused of helping Raqibul change his identity to Kohli.
Reportedly, both Raqibul and his mother used to mentally and physically torture Tara, asking her to accept Islam if she wanted her married life to be normal. She was strictly warned not to apply ‘sindoor’, failing which her hands would be broken. There were dowry demands too from the in-laws, Tara had alleged.
A group of Maulvis were also called a couple of days after their wedding where Tara was asked to convert. Tara had alleged that she was brutally beaten up after she had refused to convert. She was allegedly further threatened that not only her, her family members will also be killed if she opened her mouth.
Tara had decided to break free finally when she used a mobile phone of domestic help to call her brother and asked him to come to her in-laws’ house along with the police. The incident came to public knowledge thereafter.
Later, Raqibul Hasan had accepted that he had physically assaulted Tara but denied putting pressure for religion conversion.
Initially, the state police had registered FIRs under sections pertaining to inflicting cruelty for dowry.
However, a PIL was filed by Akhand Bharat before the Jharkhand High Court. On May 22, 2015, the Jharkhand High Court directed CBI to take over the investigations. Subsequently, it registered two FIRs, under various sections of the Indian Penal Code, including rape, outraging the modesty of women and hurting religious sentiments.
CBI charge sheet against Raqibul
In 2017, the CBI had filed a chargesheet against Ranjeet alias Raqibul, his mother Kaushal Rani, and Mushtaq Ahmed, the then Registrar (vigilance) of the Jharkhand High Court.
On June 27, 2018, a Ranchi court granted Tara Shahdeo divorce from her husband on the grounds of false information and the subsequent domestic and physical violence.
