SURAT: Gujarat BJP vice-president and former Kutch MLA, Jayanti Bhanushali resigned from all party posts after a 21-year-old woman in Surat accused him of raping her several times on the pretext of getting her admission to a fashion designing course.

Bhanushali, who represented Abdasa assembly constituency from 2007 to 2012, wrote to state BJP president Jitu Vaghani stating he was resigning from all posts till he gets a clean chit. Sources, however, said Vaghani had asked him to quit after the news of accusations against him gained steam on Friday.

The woman submitted her complaint on Tuesday to Surat police commissioner Satish Sharma and Varachha police station. She demanded police protection as she feared for her and her family’s lives.

The woman’s relative introduced her to Bhanushali (57) after she expressed her desire to study fashion designing in Ahmedabad. In November 2017, Bhanushali called her to Ahmedabad with her certificates. She was made to sit in a car and allegedly raped in a field on way to Gandhinagar. According to her complaint, Bhanushali had a knife and his associate had a gun. One person also made a video of the act, she alleged.

