An Indian man, who boasted on social media of being a supporter of rightwing extremist Hindu supporter of RSS party, has been charged with 39 counts of rape and videotaping his crimes. Balesh Dhankhar is on trial in Sydney, Australia facing 39 charges including drugging and raping five Korean women in January to October 2018 and recording them on hidden cameras.
SYDNEY – An Indian man, who boasted on social media of being a supporter of rightwing extremist Hindu supporter of RSS and BJP party, has been found guilty of rape and videotaping his crimes.
Balesh Dhankhar was found guilty of raping five Korean women in the Australian capital of Sydney after drugging them, on Monday, while terming him as “one of the worst rapists” in the city’s recent history.
Dhankhar, a prominent member of the Indian community in Australia, was also reported to be the former chief of ‘Overseas Friends of BJP’.
Dhankhar was on trial in Sydney, Australia facing 39 charges including drugging and raping five Korean women in January to October 2018 and recording them on hidden cameras.
A jury heard he had a ‘very specific modus operandi’ to ensnare the women – using the same hotel, café, and Korean restaurant in almost all the rapes, reported Daily Mail Australia.
Prosecutors alleged he spiked glasses of wine and other drinks with tablets of the sleeping drug Stilnox or infamous date-rape drug rohypnol, either at a restaurant or his flat in the World Square complex in the Sydney CBD.
Dhankhar, 43, recently gave his version of events about his initial meeting with the first woman, who accuses him of raping her six times that night.
He told the court that after they met in the lobby of the Hilton Hotel in the Sydney CBD on January 25, 2018, they went to dinner at Koibito, a nearby Korean restaurant.
There he said they drank soju and flirted as they played Korean drinking games where the loser had to kiss the winner on the cheek – until she kissed his lips.
Dhankhar said eventually they were kissing even when the games didn’t require them to, and touching each other’s legs under the table.
He said he asked her ‘how about more than this’, to which ‘she said yes, she liked it’, and he inquired ‘so you like naughty stuff?’
‘Of course I like naughty stuff,’ he told the court she replied, leading to a conversation ‘exploring what each other likes’ in the bedroom.
Dhankhar at one point took out his phone and pointed it at her to ask if she liked being filmed while having sex, to which he said she replied: ‘that would be even more fun’.
The dinner went for about three hours, some of which was at the table of two of the woman’s friends she spotted dining together at the same restaurant.
Prosecutors allege he slipped a sedative into her drink at some point during the night, and as they paid for the bill she was so drugged he had to hold her up.
Dhankhar testified she came with him to his apartment willingly, and passionately kissed him the moment they got in the door.
He described his account of their sexual activity in great detail, and claimed she enjoyed the sex because she was intermittently moaning, and enthusiastically participating when she was on top.
Dhankhar, who spent the whole three-week trial to date showing no emotion in court even as alleged rape videos were played, earlier broke down as he explained how he lured the women.
He admitted his ruse was ‘immoral’, his numerous affairs on his wife made him feel guilty, and blamed it all on a mid-life crisis.
A jury heard he had a ‘very specific modus operandi’ to ensnare and rape the women – using the same hotel, café, and Korean restaurant in almost all the rapes
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Dhankhar agreed with prosecution claims he ‘had a particular sexual interest in young Korean women’, which he said started with Korean cinema.
‘I’m drawn to the emotional side [of the cinema]… how they depict human emotion,’ he told the court.
He said his marriage started breaking down and his wife was spending months at a time in their home country of India with his young son.
Lonely and depressed, he started watching pornography frequently and attended Korean language meet-up groups and salsa classes to meet Asian women.
Dhankhar denied searching for porn of ‘unconscious or compromised people’ having sex, but may have watched them by accident. He denies having any interest in watching sleeping or drugged women porn, as the prosecution alleged.
He had three extramarital affairs, the longest being with a Japanese woman he met through friends at his salsa classes and dated for 18 months until late 2017.
Dhankhar said their breakup prompted his elaborate scheme to meet girls through fake ads for Korean translators he posted on Gumtree on December 27, 2017.
One of the first to respond was a Korean woman, who can’t be named, who after several meetings began a consensual relationship with him in February.
‘I was deeply confused and also feeling somewhat guilty,’ he said of his decision to start yet another affair.
‘It was a very complicated time for me… there was so many contradicting emotions and thoughts going on.
‘My wife and child were in India and I felt bad about that, on the other side I was lonely in Sydney, I had broken up with [his girlfriend].
‘My mind and heart were completely split, feeling bad, feeling broken, the whole process of having an affairs was like being in quicksand and in a lonely moment I would think, what am I doing, why don’t I come out of it?
‘I guess it was some kind of mental crisis, maybe a mid-life crisis.’
At the same time he was romancing her, Dhankhar is accused of raping his first alleged victim seven times on January 25 and 29, 2018.
The alleged rapes stopped after this, and only allegedly began again from September 9, 2018, after he broke up with his mistress and posted another ad on August 17.
Dhankhar is accused of raping four other women until October 21, after which he was arrested the next day after the fifth alleged victim went to police.
Dhankhar allegedly recorded the rapes on a camera hidden in a clock he bought on eBay, or on his mobile phone, which were recovered by police.
The second time he used the fake job ad ruse, he created two supposed colleagues at The Asia Partnership, the fake firm, named Dan Taylor and Dan Sid.
Dhankhar finally broke down in the witness box when he was asked by his lawyer Rebecca Mitchell why he created Dan Taylor.
‘I was confused around that time.. I had just broken up with [my girlfriend]. That time was very difficult emotionally. I just made wrong decisions in interacting with people in this manner,’ he said.
Judge Michael King ordered a break for lunch at this point, allowing the accused to regain his composure.
Dhankhar’s wife didn’t know about his various affairs, though she on several occasions suspected me may be seeing other women behind her back and confronted him.
Every time, he lied through his teeth, he admitted to the jury, even though it ‘broke my heart that I was having an affair’.
He told the court his affairs were prompted by his marriage falling apart, long times spent by himself, and his wife’s lack of interest in intimacy for months at a time.
Dhankhar allegedly recorded the rapes on a camera hidden in a clock he bought on eBay, or on his mobile phone, which were recovered by police.
A detailed spreadsheet discovered by police allegedly kept coded notes about each of his victims, with a column labelled ‘action’ describing how far the sexual activity went – those he is accused of raping were at ‘fourth base’.
The jury was also shown videos of Dhankhar having consensual sex with other Korean women, but allegedly secretly recording them with the hidden camera.
Police allegedly discovered 47 videos of Dhankhar having sex with Korean women on his computer, catalogued under the names.
He was arrested on October 21, 2018, after the fifth woman allegedly woke up while he was raping her, and sent messages to a friend while hiding in the bathroom.
Dhankhar pleaded not guilty, claiming all five women consented to sex, and to being filmed, and is in the middle of a lengthy trial in the NSW District Court.
He has spent the past more than four years fighting the charges, unsuccessfully trying to have his name suppressed.
The ‘lead data visualisation consultant’ worked for Sydney Trains during all the alleged rapes, and was hired by Pfizer and the ABC for one-year contracts while on bail in 2019 to 2021.
He is a prominent member of Australia’s Indian community, being the founding president of the OFBJP – an Australian support group for India’s ruling party.
The fourth of his alleged victims bravely told her story in court on Wednesday, claiming she woke up naked on his bed while she was being raped.
‘He kept doing it when I woke up and I said can you stop, I thought we were just friends,’ she told the court.
‘I remember I started to cry and told him I wanted to go home… he was trying to soothe me down “it’s OK, don’t cry, you’re OK…”‘
Dhankhar allegedly recorded the rapes on a camera hidden in a clock he bought on eBay, or on his mobile phone, which were recovered by police.
The court heard Dhankhar created a fake company called The Asia Partnership, named after a real firm he used to work for – but without their knowledge.
He posted job ads on Gumtree for a Korean to English translator in late 2017 and through 2018 to lure in the women, all aged in their mid-20s.
The woman, who can’t be named, responded to the ad a day after arriving in Australia on October 8, 2018, and met Dhankhar at the Hilton three days later.
She said he asked her to dinner and she declined, but met up with him at a café the next day, where he gave her a document to translate.
This time she accepted his dinner invitation and they went to Koibito, a Korean restaurant nearby, and split one or two bottles of soju.
The woman said she felt fine after the restaurant and back in Korea she regularly drank with her friends where she could down three bottles by herself and only feel tipsy.
Dhankhar offered her a lift home from Koibito but claimed he needed to get his car keys from his flat, and offered her red wine when they arrived.
They sat on his coach sipping the wines and watching Korean music videos, then he taught her salsa dancing. That was the last thing she remembered.
‘I don’t remember after that… dancing is the last thing I remember. I felt fine, but suddenly I don’t remember anything, like I blacked out,’ she told the court.
‘It was very weird. When you’re drunk or sick you would [start] to feel uncomfortable. I was fine, then I remember nothing.’
After waking up to allegedly being raped, the woman said she only had flashes of memory – of being in the building’s car park and the ride home – but not of how she got there or putting her clothes back on.
‘I felt like something isn’t OK, something isn’t right, I was trying to behave normally as I didn’t want to get in trouble any more… but my body wasn’t ready to be normal,’ she told the court.
She vomited immediately after arriving at the hostel in the early hours of the morning and again later on, then was too sick to move the next day.
Dhankhar texted her after 4am wishing her good night and saying she should have slept over at his flat.
‘I was ashamed, I was trying to figure it out,’ she told the court.
‘I was thinking maybe I was drunk or maybe he put something in my wine, I was trying to guess how it could happen.’
The woman and Dhankhar exchanged numerous text messages in following days while she tried to work out what happened.
She told him she was in an ‘unnormal state’ that night and she wasn’t sure if he noticed it.
‘I don’t understand why we did that… first time we can call it accident, that’s it. I don’t want to make second time,’ she wrote.
Dhankhar claimed the ‘both flowed with emotions’ and he ‘took full responsibility’ for that, and he didn’t want thing to be ‘awkward’.
The woman said she initially gave Dhankhar the benefit of the doubt and called it an ‘accident’ because he seemed like a good man and she blamed herself for what happened.
‘At that time I still thought it could be may fault, maybe I was drunk or my body wasn’t ready for drink… or maybe I shouldn’t have gone to his apartment,’ she told the court.
‘I didn’t know at that time he did something. I was trying to get over it, I didn’t want to keep thinking about it, or I wouldn’t move forward.’
She told him they should just be friends, and turned down his offer to help her move into a rental home because she didn’t want to owe him anything.
But she said ‘the conversation was getting frustrating, I was telling him the same things over and over again’ and she didn’t think he was a nice person anymore.
Dhankhar allegedly wrote in his spreadsheet action column next to her name ‘pipe. Base 4’ with a note that they got confused after base 4 and to ‘take it slow and bring her in’.
Dhankhar pleaded not guilty, claiming all five women consented to sex, and to being filmed, and is in the middle of a lengthy trial in the NSW District Court
Just weeks later, Dhankhar allegedly raped his fifth victim – but this one was to be his undoing.
After she responded to the ad, they met at the Hilton on October 21, 2018, followed by lunch at another Korean nearby restaurant, NaruOne.
Despite her allegedly telling him she wasn’t interested in him as more than a colleague, he convinced her to see the view of the Sydney Opera House from his balcony.
He gave her a glass of wine at the flat, and the court heard she soon felt dizzy and retreated to the bathroom where she sent a friend a screenshot of location.
‘Sister, I feel very intoxicated, however slightly different kind of intoxication. I don’t know what I should do, sister…’ she wrote.
‘I am different drunk. I am not normal drunk and I am worried myself. [He] keeps trying to kiss me… I f**ked up.’
The court heard once she emerged from the bathroom, Dhankhar tried to get her to dance but she was too tired and had double vision.
‘He pulled her up and tried to dance with her, holding her up because she couldn’t stand well. He started to kiss her face, neck, and ears but she told him no,’ the court heard.
‘He said “you don’t want to kiss me because I’m ugly”, She tried to resist but had no strength.’
The next thing she remembered was waking up to Dhankhar allegedly trying to have sex with her.
She told him ‘it’s a crime and you don’t even wear a condom’ as he struggled to penetrate her and she again lost consciousness.
When she woke up again, she dressed and tried to go home, but the walk to the door was ‘painful, difficult, and endless’.
The court heard Dhankhar drove her home and she cried uncontrollably and vomited until her roommate called the police.
Zoipidem, the active ingredient in Stilnox, was found in her blood and urine samples along with only a small amount of alcohol.
Her report led to Dhankhar’s arrest when his home was raided and police discovered Stilnox tablets and rohypnol, both of which he had a prescription for.
Prosecutor Kate Nightingale told the jury how all five of Dhankhar’s alleged rapes followed almost exactly the same pattern.
After they responded, he set up an interview at the Hilton Hotel in the Sydney CBD, where he asked them about their lives and gave them information about the ‘job’.
Dhankhar then invited the women to dinner at Koibito, where they drank soju, wine, or Korean drink makkoli.
The court heard he allegedly drugged his first known victim there on January 25, 2018, but on future occasions administered the sedative at his home instead.
Ms Nightingale told the jury he convinced them to come to his flat ‘using a variety of excuses or ruses’.
Dhankhar was allegedly still refining his chillingly similar routine with his first known victim, who met him on January 25, 2018.
This time he allegedly drugged her at Koibito instead of waiting until he got her to come home.
‘She began to feel strange and dizzy, something she never experienced before from drinking soju,’ Ms Nightingale told the jury.
‘The last thing she remembers is being at the counter of the restaurant and the accused holding her up.’
Next thing she remembered was waking up in his bed wearing her jumpsuit but the belt was missing.
Since she was clothed, she did not think the pair had sex, and continued to speak with him about the job, exchanging contacts on Korean messaging app Kocowa.
However, police later found videos allegedly showing Dhankhar rape her six times that night, all while she was unconscious and unresponsive.
On one occasion he allegedly forced open her jaw with his hand so she could perform oral sex on him.
Days later on January 29 they went to Hard Rock Café in Darling Harbour and then back to his apartment, where he gave her ice cream and wine.
Dhankhar then allegedly tried to dance and kiss her while she repeatedly refused, and was raped yet again.
Just as the first night, when she woke up with clothes on she didn’t realised she had been raped and only reported to after she was contacted by detectives in 2020.
Two other women told the court eerily similar accounts, one of whom said she pushed him away when he tried to dance with her and kiss her because she had a boyfriend.
When she woke up after allegedly being drugged and raped, she saw a condom wrapper and felt pain, leading her to realise they had sex.
She called her boyfriend in tears saying she didn’t know where she was and had to break up with him because of what happened.
Another woman who woke up in his bed naked after allegedly being raped, and refusing his offer and breakfast because she wanted to go home.
The ‘action’ column for her on Dhankhar’s spreadsheet allegedly read ‘base four’ but a note read ‘got angry on base 4, doesn’t want to continue, close’.
Ms Nightingale told the court Dhankhar ‘had a particular sexual interest in young Korean women’.
She alleged he satisfied this by ‘procuring women from false job advertisement on Gumtree, by lying to them, by pretending that he was interviewing them for a job so that he could commit sexual acts on them and make intimate recordings of them and do so whilst they were under the influence of a substance’.
‘At no time in these encounters were [the women] freely and voluntarily agreeing to these acts.’
The court heard Dhankhar allegedly accessed and bookmarked large amount of pornography with Asian women and even more with Koreans.
Videos allegedly included women who were unconscious or asleep such as ‘Korean girl sleeping f**ked by boy’.
Dhankhar faces 13 charges of rape, six of administering an intoxicating substance with intent to enable himself to rape, 17 of recording intimate videos without consent, and three of indecent assault.
Courtesy Daily Mail Australia
