Mysuru politico to care for teen he allegedly raped

The Supreme Court on Monday issued a notice to the Karnataka government on a bail plea by a man who has been sentenced to 14 years imprisonment for raping a 15-year-old and fathering a child in Mysuru.

A bench of Justices J Chelameswar and Sanjay Kishan Kaul sought a response from the state government as advocate Rajesh Mahale, appearing for the petitioner J Mahesh Gowda, contended that he was ready to take care of the girl as well as the child.

"The petitioner is 35-year-old. He is ready to take care of the girl, who is 19-year-old now and the child, who is about 4-year-old now. He had earlier too taken care of them financially," the counsel said.

Gowda, a real estate agent and president of Mysuru district BSR Congress, was sentenced to 14-year jail with Rs five lakh fine for raping the minor girl by the Mysuru court. He challenged the Karnataka High Court's order of January 18, declining to release him on pending his appeal.

According to the prosecution, Gowda had repeatedly raped the girl, who delivered a child in 2014. Initially, he refused the charges but the DNA test proved that he was the child's father.

The police claimed Mahesh had come in contact with the victim's mother after the death of her husband and he used to help her financially. His eyes fell on the woman's daughter and he sexually abused her, impregnating the victim. During the trial, the victim had stated that as Mahesh was helping her family to come out of financial crisis, she did not report the rape, though Mahesh violated her repeatedly.

Even the victim's mother told the court that she did not notice her daughter's pregnancy for nine months and she realised that her daughter was pregnant, just three days before she delivered the child.

The complaint in the matter was lodged with the Vidyaranyapuram police station by some other woman after she came to know that a 15-year-old girl had delivered a child at Amrithakripa charitable hospital.