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Notorious sex trafficker ‘Santro’ Ravi who had been absconding for several days has been arrested in Gujarat by the Karnataka police. He has been arrested after a complaint filed by a Dalit woman who accused him of dowry harassment, rape and physical assault. He had been booked by Mysuru police under sections of Dowry Prohibition Act and the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act. The Karnataka government had come under much criticism with the opposition alleging that top BJP ministers had helped Ravi escape.
Additional Director General of Police (Law and Order) Alok Kumar, addressing a press conference in Mysuru, said that teams had been sent to neighbouring states including Telangana and Kerala. “Ravi has been arrested near Ahmedabad and we have already secured a transit warrant. He will be brought to Karnataka soon,” Alok Kumar told the media. He added that Ravi had been changing his locations and mobile phones which made it difficult for the police to track him.
The Karnataka police had formed six teams to search for and arrest ‘Santro’ Ravi after an FIR was filed in Mysuru’s Vijayanagar police station on January 2, 2023. A lookout notice too had been issued to prevent him from leaving the country, Alok Kumar said.
Left to Right: Santro Ravi after and before his arrest
Recently, pictures and videos of ‘Santro’ Ravi with prominent Karnataka ministers caused much embarrassment for the BJP government. KS Manjunath alias ‘Santro’ Ravi has a long history of trafficking of women and children for sex. Audio clips of a voice that purportedly belonged to ‘Santro’ Ravi, heard discussing deals for favourable transfers for police officers, have also surfaced.
In the recordings, Ravi boasts about his connections to party leaders and the police, and photos show him with Primary Education Minister BC Nagesh, Home Minister Araga Jnanendra, and Health Minister K Sudhakar. Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai denied any connections between the ministers and Ravi and claimed that it is difficult to verify all visitors to the ministers.
Ravi has a history of criminal cases against him dating back to 2003, including charges of dowry harassment, human trafficking, and rape across the state of Karnataka. He gained the moniker ‘Santro’ due to accusations that he used a Hyundai Santro car to kidnap women and force them into the sex trade.
Recently, he was booked under the Dowry Prohibition Act and the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act in Mysuru, based on a complaint by a Dalit woman who accused him of raping her and threatening her to marry him. She alleged that when she responded to a job advertisement he placed in a local newspaper, he drugged her with sedatives and then blackmailed her into marrying him.
In 2018, police raided a luxury hotel in Bengaluru and rescued a woman who had allegedly been trafficked for sex and Ravi had been named as the kingpin behind the operation, but he fled before the police could arrest him. He had already been named as a habitual offender in police records and had been booked in several cases before that. Earlier the same year, he had been arrested on charges of human trafficking by Vijayanagar police, was remanded to judicial custody and was later granted bail.
Watch: Complainant against ‘Santro’ Ravi: ‘In shock after learning how many women he has cheated’