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Bengaluru, Nov 13 (IANS) Former Janata Dal-Secular MP and grandson of former Prime Minister HD Deve Gowda, Prajwal Revanna, who was sentenced to life imprisonment in a sex video and rape case, said his continued detention is unfair.
A division bench of Justice KS Mudgal and Justice T. Venkatesh Naik heard the appeal case on Thursday and postponed the next hearing till November 24.
The bench asked Prajwal to submit the gist of his arguments to the court.
The bench also asked the prosecution to file objections by the next date of hearing.
Prajwal Revanna, through his lawyer, also said that the prosecution’s case lacks strength, the evidence does not establish a clear link, and hence, his continued detention is unjustified.
Senior advocate Siddharth Luthra, representing Prajwal Revanna, said the conviction was announced on August 1, 2025 and sentencing was announced on August 2.
He also said that Prajwal should have been given a fair opportunity of being heard before sentencing, adding that if the court intended to impose the maximum punishment, it should at least be allowed to present factors that could reduce the severity of the punishment.
“If the core of the prosecution’s case is weak and the evidence does not clearly link me to the alleged crime, then there is no valid reason to keep Prajwal in jail,” he said.
He also said that his first argument is that video evidence taken from open sources like social media or the internet cannot be trusted.
He also said that the alleged crime was reported three to four years after it occurred, and even when the victim came in contact with the police, there was a delay in filing the complaint.
Additionally, he said the farmhouse where the alleged attack took place no longer exists and now belongs to someone else – meaning it makes it difficult to verify or investigate the claims.
He also said that the prosecution did not produce the victim’s phone call records, which could have been used to verify the victim’s location at the time of the alleged incident.
He stressed that the recovery of the victims’ clothes from the farm house was suspicious.
Prajwal Revanna, who was arrested in May 2024 after returning from Germany, is challenging the court’s decision on several grounds, including what he claims are contradictions in the victim’s testimony and inconsistencies in the evidence presented by the prosecution.
A special court that convicted Revanna had sentenced him to imprisonment for the rest of his life and imposed a fine on one of the four counts of sexual assault and rape against him.
–IANS
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