India’s wrestling chief charged with sexual harassment

NEW DELHI: Police in India have filed charges of sexual harassment and criminal intimidation against the chief of the country’s wrestling federation, a member of parliament with Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata party (BJP), following complaints by female wrestlers.

The public prosecutor Atul Srivastav read out the charges against Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh at a court hearing in Delhi. If convicted he faces up to three years in jail.

In an interview on Wednesday to local media, Singh rejected all allegations against him. After the reading out of the charges, an aide to Singh said the lawmaker “will continue to cooperate with police and will respect the court’s decision”. The next hearing is slated for later this month.

A police official said last week more than 155 people had been questioned in the investigation, which followed months of complaints by the country’s top wrestlers, including several Olympic and Asian Games medallists.

Wrestlers began a sit-in protest against the lack of action in April and were briefly detained by police in Delhi as they cleared the site the following month. Images of the athletes being dragged away and carried off in buses went viral, prompting criticism from top athletes and opposition politicians.

The wrestlers also threatened to throw their medals into the Ganges, India’s holiest river, before agreeing to meet the home affairs minister, Amit Shah, and later the sports minister, Anurag Thakur.

Amid mounting outrage, the wrestlers suspended their protest after Thakur set a 15 June deadline to conclude the investigation into Singh.

Srivastav told reporters outside the court that two police complaints had been filed in the case. “We have filed criminal charges in a case filed by six wrestlers but we have sought closure in the other case filed on behalf of a minor alleging sexual harassment,” he said.

The charges by the minor, which could have attracted more severe punishment if proved, were dropped after her father withdrew the allegations, he said.

The case has caused an international furore. This month, Sport and Rights Alliance, a global coalition of non-governmental organisations that promotes human rights in sports, urged the International Olympic Committee to ensure a transparent, independent and impartial investigation into the allegations.

“It takes a lot of courage to break the silence and disclose a case of sexual abuse,” the network coordinator Joanna Maranhão said.