Muzaffarpur rapes: absconding Bihar ex-minister Manju Verma surrenders

Former Bihar Minister Manju Verma, who was absconding for nearly three months in an Arms Act case related to the Muzaffarpur shelter home case, surrendered at a court on Tuesday, November 20.

Manju Verma surrendered in the Begusarai District Court after a lower court and the Patna High Court rejected her interim bail petition. The Supreme Court had slammed Bihar Police for its failure to arrest her and directed the DGP to appear before it in person on November 27, if she was not nabbed by then.

Verma reached the court of the Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate Prabhat Trivedi in an auto rickshaw. She fainted as soon as she entered the court premises along with a few aides.

She regained consciousness after water was sprinkled on her face by bystanders after which she was taken into the courtroom. According to police, Manju Verma covered her face while reaching the court.

Police in Bihar on Saturday, November 17, started attaching the properties of Manju Verma after a court order in an arms case connected to the Muzaffarpur shelter home horror.

Verma faces arrest under the Arms Act following the recovery of 50 live cartridges from her residences in Patna and Begusarai during a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) raid.

Last month, a court in Begusarai issued a warrant against her.

Verma had stepped down as the minister for social welfare in August, following reports that her husband, Chandrashekhar Verma, had close links with Brajesh Thakur, the prime accused in the Muzaffarpur shelter home scandal. Over 30 girls were allegedly raped at the shelter home. Thakur is now in the Muzaffarpur jail.

In October, her husband Chandrasekhar Verma, who had been absconding for a month, surrendered before a court after which he was sent to 14 days judicial custody in connection with the shelter home case.

Of the 42 girls lodged at the short-stay home run by Thakur's NGO, 34 were found to have been sexually assaulted. The crime came to light after a social audit by the Tata Institute of Social Science, Mumbai.