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The Karnataka High Court has declined to suspend the life sentence handed to former JD(S) MP Prajwal Revanna, firmly closing the door on his bid for bail in one of the four rape cases shadowing his political fall.

In a stern order delivered on Wednesday, a division bench of justice K.S. Mudagal and justice Venkatesh Naik T. held that the enormity of the charges, the existence of multiple pending cases, and the looming threat of witness intimidation made this “wholly unfit” for interim relief. The court observed that even during the trial Revanna was denied bail, noting that the survivor had hesitated to come forward because of the “power and influence” he wielded.

Senior advocate Sidharth Luthra, appearing for Revanna, sought to pierce the conviction by calling the evidence fragile and tainted by a “relentless media trial.” He cast doubt on the electronic records, flagged delays in filing the FIR, pointed to forensic irregularities, and insisted that the defence was denied a fair opportunity to argue for a lighter sentence. Political vengeance, he claimed, lay beneath the accusations.

But special public prosecutor professor Ravivarma Kumar countered that releasing Revanna would place the survivor and witnesses in grave danger, reminding the court of earlier attempts to abduct key witnesses. He underlined the gravity of the repeated sexual assaults allegedly committed against a vulnerable domestic worker during the COVID lockdown, and Revanna’s purported non-cooperation — including his failure to surrender his phone — which weighed heavily against leniency.

Citing Supreme Court guidelines that cases involving elected representatives must be fast-tracked, Kumar argued that the appeal itself would be heard swiftly, making suspension of sentence unnecessary. After conviction, he stressed, the principle shifts: “jail is the rule, not bail,” adding that the survivor’s testimony alone was sufficient in law to uphold the verdict.

The Bench, noting that the defence’s submissions largely strayed into merits of the appeal, made clear that any alleged evidentiary gaps would be examined only during the final hearing. At this stage, it said, the high court could not be expected to re-evaluate every thread of evidence afresh — and found no prima facie fault in the trial court’s decision.

With the plea dismissed, the court has fixed 12 January 2026, for final hearing of the appeal.

The case for which Revanna now serves a life term involves a 48-year-old woman employed as a help at the family’s Gannikada farmhouse in Holenarasipura, Hassan district. She was allegedly raped twice — once at the farmhouse and again at the Bengaluru residence — in 2021, acts that prosecutors say Revanna recorded on his mobile phone.

The trial court, in its verdict, relied on multiple strands of evidence: video footage, forensic examination of hair samples, and biological traces recovered from the survivor’s clothing.

Revanna’s legal troubles continue to pile up. Four separate cases — involving accusations of rape, assault, and sexual harassment — are being probed by a Special Investigation Team. The scandal erupted after pen-drives containing explicit videos, allegedly linked to Revanna, were circulated across Hassan in the run-up to the 26 April 2024 Lok Sabha polls, setting off one of Karnataka’s most explosive political controversies in recent memory.

With PTI inputs