After keeping silent for a couple of months following allegations of sexual harassment of a woman government employee, Jana Sena Party MLA from Railway Kodudu assembly constituency Arava Sridhar seems to have returned to active party activities rather quietly.
According to reports, Sridhar has been participating in the Jana Sena Party programmes for the last three days wearing party scarf, though party president and deputy chief minister Pawan Kalyan had, on January 28, asked him to keep himself away from the party, till the case against him is disposed of.
Pawan Kalyan even ordered an internal inquiry into serious allegations of sexual assault and intimidation levelled against party Sridhar. He appeared before the committee and gave his explanation.
Nobody knows what conclusion the party committee has arrived at after the inquiry and what it had reported to Pawan Kalyan. But Sridhar has been away from the party activities till recently.
Though there are no indications of Pawan Kalyan giving him clean chit, he began appearing on the party forums and also moving actively in the constituency.
This has apparently irked the woman, who had levelled serious allegations against him. On Friday, she objected to his return to public life and threatened to end her life if she was not given justice.
In a new selfie video released on social media, the woman questioned how Sridhar was publicly participating in programmes while wearing the Jana Sena Party scarf, and asked whether party chief Pawan Kalyan had approved his re-entry into political activity.
She expressed anger over the MLA’s visible public engagements and issued a dramatic warning, saying she would pour petrol on herself and commit suicide in front of the Jana Sena Party office if her grievances continued to be ignored.
“If they are going to deny me justice, then suicide is my only option,” she said in the video.
The latest development has reignited attention on the allegations first made against Sridhar in January this year.
At the time, the woman — a government employee — accused the Jana Sena MLA of sexually assaulting her for over a year on the promise of marriage and forcing her to undergo abortions.
She also alleged that he subjected her to sustained harassment and intimidation. She further alleged that she had undergone five abortions over the past year and said the MLA repeatedly threatened and tortured her.
The woman’s latest threat has now added a new dimension to the controversy, potentially increasing pressure on both the MLA and the Jana Sena leadership to respond more decisively.
