Karnataka High Court stays sexual assault case filed by youth against filmmaker Ranjith

The Karnataka High Court recently stayed the investigation and further proceedings in an unnatural sex case filed against Malayalam filmmaker Ranjith Balakrishnan by an aspiring male actor..Justice M Nagaprasanna said that the case seemed false on the face of it since the Taj Hotel near Bengaluru Airport, where the alleged incident supposedly occurred, opened only in 2016, four years after the claimed event, highlighting a glaring factual inaccuracy.The Court also noted that there was a 12-year delay in filing the complaint and there was no justification for the same, thus bringing into the question the credibility of the allegations.“The complaint on the face of it, is false. I don’t even say prima facie, as the Taj Hotel near Bengaluru International Airport starts its operation only in the year 2016, this is in public domain, it is four years after the incident. Therefore, the vivid narration at Taj hotel is absolutely false. This is thus a canard. The complaint is registered in the year 2024 and the alleged incident is said to have happened in the year 2012. Therefore, it has taken 12 years for the complainant to register the complaint. Delay of 12 years is also left completely unexplained. Therefore, on all these factors it becomes a classic case of falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus,” the Court said..The Court was hearing a plea filed by Ranjith seeking quashing of the case. The case arose from a complaint by an aspiring actor against Ranjith alleging him of engaging in unnatural sex with him in 2012 at the Taj Hotel near Bengaluru International Airport. The complainant claimed he was invited to the fourth floor of the Taj hotel, where the alleged incident occurred. He also provided detailed description of the events.Ranjith was booked for offences under Section 377 (unnatural offences) of the IPC and Section 66E (punishment for violation of privacy) of the Information Technology Act, 2000.He then approached the High Court to quash the first information report (FIR). However, the complaint was filed in 2024, twelve years after the alleged incident, and the petitioner's counsel highlighted factual inconsistencies, including that the Taj Hotel near Bengaluru Airport began operations only in 2016, making the claim improbable..The Court observed that the complaint lacked credibility due to a 12-year delay in filing, factual inconsistencies regarding the hotel's operational timeline and the implausibility of the allegations.Accordingly, the Court passed an interim order staying the investigation and all related proceedings till the disposal of petition.The matter will be heard again on January 17..The petitioner was represented by Senior Advocate Prabhuling Navadgi along with advocate Joseph Anthony..[Read Order]