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An Indian court has sentenced a prominent journalist to 10 years in prison for raping a junior colleague more than a decade ago, overturning an earlier acquittal.
Tarun Tejpal, 62, was accused of raping a female colleague in a lift at a five-star hotel during a Tehelka magazine event in 2013.
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The Goa bench of Bombay High Court on Thursday also ordered Tejpal to pay a fine of $5,250.
“He has been convicted to 10 years of rigorous imprisonment. He has been given two weeks’ time to surrender,” Goa Police investigator Sunita Sawant, who led the investigation, told reporters.
Tejpal denied the allegations and said before the verdict that he would appeal.
“All I can say is I am 62. I believe I am a political victim, I am a father of two daughters. I have a wife. All we can say is we will go up and appeal. My lawyer wants me to request you to be lenient,” Tejpal told the court ahead of sentencing, according to the Indian legal news outlet Bar and Bench.
The allegations emerged during a period of heightened public concern over sexual violence against women, culminating in mass protests after a 23-year-old student was gang raped on a bus in New Delhi in December 2012. In response, the government strengthened rape laws.
Thursday’s verdict overturned a 2021 acquittal by a Goa court, which dismissed charges of rape, sexual harassment and wrongful restraint against Tejpal.
The Goa government challenged that decision at the Bombay High Court, leading to the acquittal being overturned.
Following the allegations in November 2013, Tejpal initially described what happened as “a bad lapse of judgement”. In an email to employees, he wrote that “an awful misreading of the situation” had “led to an unfortunate incident that rails against all we believe in and fight for”.
Tejpal said he would take six months’ leave of absence as “penance” for the assault, provoking anger and accusations that he had trivialised the matter. He was later arrested and spent seven months in jail before being released on bail by the Supreme Court.
He later alleged that the case against him was part of a “political vendetta” by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government in Goa.
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