Kochi: Indian Navy “wife-swapping scandal” takes new turn. Complaint wife of officer being harassed by police while Indian Army trying to snub media not to report the case, reports Dispatch News desk (DND).
In April 2013, wife of a Indian Navy officers in Kochi alleged that there is deep insecurity among wives of Indian naval force because there are attempts and scandals of wife swapping in the Kochi Naval Base.
Now in first week of August New Delhi in implicating this 25-year-old wife of Naval officer who is a language student from Jawaharlal Lal Nehru University on charges of forgery following her case against her Navy officer husband for coercing her into participating in “wife-swapping evenings”, south district police have said they have enough evidence to charge sheet her.
“She applied for two credit cards using a fake belt number which she ascribed to her estranged husband. The naval commanding officer’s name she had mentioned in her application form was found to be fake and so were the signatures,” said an investigating officer.
The woman was arrested in Mumbai earlier in another case of cheating, police said. Vasant Vihar police will now be visiting Mumbai to collect details. Her husband is posted in Kochi naval base. Police said that they made sure she was not unnecessarily held at the station. “Even though it was late at night we did not oppose her bail,” added the officer.
DCP (South) B S Jaiswal said they acted after receiving a complaint that the woman, who had recently taken admission in the first year at JNU, had submitted forged documents to SBI’s IIT branch to acquire a credit card. He added that since the woman used Navy emblems, a charge under the Emblem and Name (Prevention of Improper Use) Act, 1950 has been slapped on her. Kamini Jaiswal, the victim’s lawyer, said the “incident smacks of victimization”. “She was picked up from her rented residence in Jia Sarai. She was not even allowed to wear her slippers,” she said.
It may be mentioned that in April 2013, a scandal has erupted at the Naval Base in Kochi, headquarters of the Southern Naval Command, with the Kochi Harbour Police registering cases against some senior Naval officials on a compliant of the wife of a Lieutenant that he used to force her to go to bed with senior officials and that wife-swapping among senior officials was rampant at the base.
As per the complaint lodged by the woman, a native of Odisha who lived in Delhi before marriage, she was being harassed both physically and mentally by her husband, a Lieutenant, his senior officials and their wives for questioning the immoral goings-on at the Naval Base. However, the Navy claimed that this was only a case of marital discord.
The Kochi Harbour Police have booked one Commodore, four Lieutenants including the husband, three of his relatives, a Captain and his wife under sections of laws concerning domestic violence, attempted sexual abuse, coercion for sexual abuse, torture and unlawful custody. But the Navy termed her charges against the senior officers as “unfair”.
The Lieutenant’s wife said that she was being harassed by him, his senior officials and even their wives for not subjecting herself to the sexual fancies of the seniors. “Some of the officials had tried to assault me sexually and it was these people who had cut my hair,” she said.
The woman, who had come to Kochi from New Delhi a year ago following her husband’s transfer here, said that the evening parties being held at the Naval Base regularly were venues for immoral interactions among the participants and that her husband used to force her to sleep with senior officials after such parties.
“They are swapping wives… I tried to complain about what happened to me but nobody listened.
The Navy is protecting them,” she said while talking to the media. The woman, who is presently staying with a friend in Kochi, is reportedly planning to approach the High Court as the police might have limitations in dealing with a case involving top Navy brass.
The husband, first accused as per the FIR, told the Harbour Police that his wife was having mental disturbances but he could not produce any evidence with regard to his claim. “After all, there seems to be some substance in the woman’s complaint,” said a police official. The husband and others have approached the High Court for anticipatory bail.
The Navy claimed that the woman was “dragging her ‘estranged’ husband’s colleagues – who had tried to resolve the issues dogging the couple’s personal life – into the vortex of their unhappy relationship.” A Naval release said on Wednesday that the force “will cooperate with the law enforcement agencies to ensure speedy completion of the investigation.”
“I once saw my husband with the wife of a Captain, his senior officer. When I tried to make an issue out of this, I was locked up in a room by my husband and the Captain’s wife,” the woman told the media.
She said she had contacted Defence Minister AK Antony’s house but was advised to lodge a complaint in the form a formal letter for which she neither had the convenience nor the time. Following this, she said, she tried to lodge a complaint directly with the Commander-in-Chief of Naval staff at the Naval Base but that attempt also was met with failure.
