The Kochi city police are closing in on the beleaguered actor-producer Vijay Babu who is accused of raping a young upcoming actor by gearing to move for impounding his passport very shortly.
Police are convinced that he is now in Dubai after fleeing the country after getting wind of the registration of the case against him by the Ernakulam South police. He may be given another two days at the most for returning voluntarily and cooperating with the legal process failing which police will set in motion the process to impound his passport.
“That process takes just 24 hours. Since there is already a lookout circular against him, he will not be able to travel anywhere from Dubai. He will be practically stuck there waiting for us to go there and nab him. We hope good sense will prevail and he will return on his own as he will have to face the law soon rather than later and delaying it will only be all the more damaging to his professional career,” said C.H. Nagaraju, District Police Chief (Kochi City).
Police will also oppose his anticipatory bail when the High Court takes up his plea next month after the vacation. Babu is likely to stay abroad till a verdict on his plea.
A case was registered against Babu for rape on April 22 and then five days later he was slapped with another case for identifying the survivor on a Facebook live. Though the post was lifted since then, it had done the damage by then with organisations like Women in Cinema Collective going all out against him.
Though police had tried to keep the moves against him since the receipt of the petition to the registration of the case secret, Babu still managed to get wind of it. “Learning that he was in Goa, we despatched a team there to nab him on the same night as the case was registered. But he switched off his mobile phones and managed to flee to Bengaluru and from there to Dubai,” said Mr. Nagaraju.
Police are still continuing with the collection of evidence, including CCTV footage, against the accused having already done so in four places, including flats and hotels where he was suspected to have had gone with the survivor. More places are under the radar.
While the rape case was serious enough, Babu’s Facebook live naming the survivor had been equally or more damaging for him. Police suspect that he was either overconfident or had no clue about the magnitude of the offence of revealing the survivor.
