NEW DELHI (Web Desk) – ‘Peepli Live’ co-director Mahmood Farooqui was on Thursday sentenced to seven years in jail and was also ordered to pay a fine of Rs 50,000 to the victim.
The court said that if Farooqui didn’t pay the fine, his jail sentence would be increased by three months.
Farooqui, who also specializes in the art of Urdu storytelling called Dastangoi, was on July 30 convicted of raping the American woman at his South Delhi residence last year. The filmmaker, who at the time of the conviction was out on bail, was taken into custody soon after the court found him guilty, Indian media reported.
The case relates to the March 28, 2015 rape of a 35-year-old American, a student at New York’s Columbia University, who was in the Capital for research work on her doctoral thesis. During her deposition as a prosecution witness in the court, the woman alleged that Farooqui raped her and later apologized via several e-mails exchanged between them. Farooqui denied the allegations and said he was falsely implicated.
Delhi police had filed its charge-sheet in the case on June 29, alleging that Farooqui raped the woman at his Sukhdev Vihar residence. Police also accused Farooqui of destroying evidence against him but Farooqui denied the allegations.
