A local court of Ludhiana on Sunday sent Karamjit Singh Bains to two-day police custody.
The Ludhiana police had on Saturday arrested Karamjit, brother of Lok Insaf Party (LIP) chief and former MLA Simarjeet Singh Bains, in the alleged rape case of a 44-year-old woman.
Simarjeet, the two-time former MLA from Atam Nagar constituency, is still absconding in the case. A local court of Ludhiana had declared Simarjeet and other accused in the case as “proclaimed offenders” in April this year after they failed to appear for hearings and police also failed to arrest them. The former MLA had then moved the Punjab and Haryana High Court (HC), which also rejected his plea to quash the order declaring him as proclaimed offender. Ludhiana joint commissioner of police (JCP, rural) Ravcharan Singh Brar said, “Karamjit was arrested in the rape case from Ranjit Avenue where the family’s new house was under construction. We are also in the process of attaching their properties and seizing bank accounts as per the court orders.”
Simarjeet was booked in a rape case filed by a 44-year-old woman last year who alleged that the LA “raped” her multiple times in 2020, when she approached him for help in a property dispute case. The FIR was registered against Simarjeet, his two brothers — Karamjit Singh and Paramjit Singh — and four others, under Sections 376 (rape), 354 (assault or criminal force on woman with an intent to outrage her modesty), 354-A (sexual harassment), 506 (criminal intimidation) and 120-B (conspiracy) of IPC, at division number 6 police station on July 10, 2021. While Simarjeet always maintained that the rape case against him and his brothers was “politically motivated” and was filed ahead of the Assembly elections 2022, the complainant had alleged that Ludhiana police was not arresting Simarjeet due to “political pressure” even as he was addressing public rallies ahead of the elections.