A POCSO court today reserved its order on an application moved by former UP minister Gayatri Prasad Prajapati seeking discharge in the gang rape case in which he is languishing in jail.
Special judge Umashanker Sharma reserved his order till September 19 on the application by Prajapati, who has been charge-sheeted along with five others in the case.
Prajapati, who was a minister in the erstwhile Samajwadi Party government in Uttar Pradesh, pleaded through his lawyer that the FIR of the incident had been lodged after three years.
He said that the offence under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POSCO) was not prima-facie made out and as such he should be discharged in the case.
The prosecution opposed the plea arguing that charges were already framed and hence the application at this stage was not maintainable and deserved to be rejected.
After the arguments of both the sides concluded, the court reserved its order.
On the directions of the Supreme Court, issued on February 18, 2017, an FIR was registered by Gautampalli police on the application of a Chitrakoot woman who alleged that Prajapati and his aides raped her and threatened to rape her daughter.
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