‘Overseas Friends of BJP’ ex-chief guilty of rape

Tribune News Service

New Delhi/Rohtak, April 24

A Sydney court on Monday arraigned Balesh Dhankhar, former president of “Overseas Friends of BJP” in Australia, for drugging and sexually assaulting five Korean women while recording the attacks, sometimes with a camera hidden in an alarm clock.

Haryanvi community in Oz condemns him

I have been getting calls from several people regarding Balesh Dhankhar. I feel ashamed to admit he belongs to my country. Dr Madhvi Mohindra, Chief, Haryanvi Association of Australia

Described as one of the “worst rapists” in Sydney’s recent history, Dhankhar, who hails from Rewari in Haryana, is alleged to have lured five women who were plied with sedatives and filmed while being sexually assaulted. Dhankhar will face the court again in May and will be sentenced later in the year.

Photographs retrieved from the archives showed him “politically connected”. He has pictures with PM Narendra Modi and top Indian personalities in Sydney, besides while speaking at local government events. Australian newspapers also reported that there was a photo of Dhankhar at PM Modi’s oath-taking ceremony in India.

Australian media reports said a police raid on his apartment in 2018 uncovered a stash of videos of his acts. “The videos were sorted into folders, each labelled with a Korean woman’s name,” reported the Sydney Morning Herald.

Following the news, Dhankhar’s family members in Rewari confined themselves to their house. His father, a retired government official, and brother, who works for a private company, refused to speak to the media even as Haryanvis based in Australia said he brought a bad name to the state and they were ashamed of his deeds.

“I have been getting calls from several people regarding Dhankhar. I feel ashamed to admit that he belongs to my country,” said Dr Madhvi Mohindra, president, Haryanvi Association of Australia, while talking to The Tribune.

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