A FRAUGHT ACQUITTAL

Mollywood superstar Dileep gets lower court relief in Kerala actress rape case

- Jeemon Jacob

AFTER EIGHT YEARS AND 10 MONTHS, Kerala's sensational actress rape case finally saw a verdict. But it wasn't what many expected. On December 8, Honey M. Varghese, principal sessions judge, Ernakulam, acquitted the eighth accused, superstar Dileep (or Gopalakrishnan Padmanabhan), of conspiracy charges while convicting Sunilkumar aka Pulsar Suni and five others for the crime. Dileep was acquitted as the prosecution "could not prove beyond doubt" his role in the sordid case. The state has said it will appeal in the high court.

The prosecution narrative was a dark parable that captured Kerala in moral horror. It had a superstar villain and three top actresses billed as wife, paramour and victim. Dileep held an old grudge against the last, the story went, for exposing his affair to his then wife. Dileep and Manju Warrier divorced in 2014; he married Kavya Madhavan in 2016. So the presumed 'exposé' can be roughly dated.