Woman alleges repeated rape by AAP candidate and associates

Gwalior: A woman has filed a complaint alleging that Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) candidate from Guna-Shivpuri Lok Sabha seat Shailendra Singh Kushwaha and three office bearers allegedly raped her at least three times over a period of more than a year, the police said on Thursday. [caption id=“attachment_1444943” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Representative Image. Reuters[/caption] AAP Madhya Pradesh State Secretary Akshay Hunka reached Gwalior today to look into the matter and termed the allegations as “politically motivated, aimed at tarnishing Kushwaha’s image”. The 30-year-old complainant said that she was associated with Anna Hazare’s anti-corruption movement and had later joined the AAP. She alleged that Kushwaha and three other office bearers, identified as Gwalior district AAP convenor Himanshu Kulshreshta, AAP district secretary Abhijit Wagh and AAP district spokesperson Manuraj Saxena raped her at least thrice, about a year ago, the police said. The woman claimed that she went to Raipur later and came back to file a complaint at the Kampu police station yesterday, after suffering for almost a year. She said that she lodged a police complaint only after she reported the matter to AAP leaders in Delhi, who did not help her. Meanwhile, Additional Superintendent of Police (ASP) Virendra Jain said that as per Supreme Court guidelines if an incident of rape is more than three months old, then an FIR in the matter would be filed only after a probe, which the police has initiated. However, Kushwaha dismissing her allegations as “baseless and aimed at tarnishing his image,” said that he was told that the woman filed the complaint at the behest of two party workers, in order to settle political scores, since she has complained after more than a year. PTI