A 45-year-old man has been arrested by the police for allegedly raping a woman and threatening to defame her with private videos that he shot without her consent.
The matter surfaced on Friday when the victim, a 38-year-old woman, a resident of Chembur, approached the RCF police. She said that she had been friends with a man named Uttam Khandgale, a broker by profession, since November 2022.
During this tenure, the victim alleged that she was forced into a physical relationship by him, despite her refusal.
According to the police, the victim’s daughter, a college-goer, found the two together and she expressed her disapproval of them. The victim then said that she started maintaining a distance from the accused, however, he kept on pursuing her and her daughter as well by following her.
Gradually, the perseverance turned into threats. The accused man showed some videos to the victim which he had shot without her knowledge. He even threatened to leak the video among her friends and relatives if she didn’t meet him. At first, she didn’t pay heed to his threats but later found that Khandgale had shown those photos and videos to some of the women in her building.
After registering the first information report, police arrested the accused on Sunday afternoon. He has been charged with sections 376 (rape), 376 (2) (n) (repeated rape on the same woman), 354 (d) (stalking), 500 (defamation), 504 (intentional insult), 506 (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code.
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