Panaji, Goa:
The Goa Police said they couldn't find him. Yet, John Fernandes, the South Goa politician accused of raping a Russian girl, spoke freely to NDTV on camera.
(Watch: NDTV tracks down Goa rape accused) And on Wednesday afternoon, he arrived at the Crime Branch office voluntarily.
In his interview to NDTV, Fernandes denied that he raped a Russian girl on the first of December in his car after having dinner with the alleged victim and her friend.
Fernandes was granted anticipatory bail on Tuesday. He describes the case against him as politically motivated.
The alleged victim, who works at a five-star hotel in Goa, has written to the Russian consulate to say she wants to drop the case because she's worried about her safety. She claims that supporters of Fernandes assaulted her on Tuesday.
"I was sitting in the car along with my friend when a mob encircled us and tried to attack. Thankfully, car windows were pulled halfway up and they could not reach us," the girl told PTI last night.
The alleged victim and her boyfriend have repeatedly accused the police of trying to bully them into dropping the case. Fernandes lost the Assembly election in 2007 as a candidate of the Save the Goa Front.
The victim says Fernandes spiked her drink at dinner, and then offered her a lift home. She says she was raped after Fernandes and she dropped her friend home. However, her friend denies being dropped home first. Fernandes also says he was never alone with the alleged victim in the car.
What's clear is that the police's investigation has been remarkably lax. Fernandes has been neither interrogated nor arrested; the police claims it couldn't find him. His car, the alleged scene of the crime, has not been examined for evidence.