SINGAPORE – The owner of a bar in Little India has been convicted of raping a 17-year-old girl who worked for him after she ran away from the Singapore Girls’ Home.

Raj Kumar Bala, 41, was accused of molesting and raping the victim between the night of Feb 21, 2020, and the early morning of Feb 22 at his rented condominium unit while she was drunk.

He faced three charges relating to the victim – one for rape, one for outrage of modesty and one for harbouring her.

He indicated that he would plead guilty to the harbouring charge, but contested the rape and molestation charges in a trial that began in August 2023. He claimed that the girl had consented to having sex with him.

On March 28, a High Court judge found him guilty of the two charges, saying that sufficient evidence has been presented by the prosecution to prove that the girl did not consent to the sex acts.

The case has been adjourned to a later date for sentencing.

The victim cannot be named owing to a gag order.

Raj Kumar also faces another 22 charges, mainly for sex offences, against five other victims.

He is accused of raping and molesting a victim identified in court documents as B1; raping and sexually assaulting a victim who was identified as B5; and raping, molesting and threatening another victim, identified as B6.

He is also accused of sexually penetrating a minor under the age of 16, identified as B7; and molesting and causing alarm to another victim identified as B8.

These charges will be dealt with at a later date.

For the current case, the victim went to interview for a job at the Dunlop Street bar in February 2020. Raj Kumar hired her and told her that she could stay at the bar with two other runaways.

On the night of Feb 21, 2020, the bar was raided by the police after an acquaintance of the runaways made a report that they were working there.

Raj Kumar drove the three runaways to his rented condo and told them they could stay there.

He drank with the girls, and the victim became heavily intoxicated.

He ended up having sex with the victim and also engaged in sex acts with another girl – the alleged victim identified as B1 – on the second floor of the unit. The third girl remained on the first floor.

The victim left the condo later that day. She stayed with a friend and told him about the rape two to three weeks later.

She surrendered herself to the home on July 20, 2020, and told her case worker from the Ministry of Social and Family Development on Aug 5, 2020, that she had been raped.

On March 28, Justice Mavis Chionh said the girl’s version of events was corroborated by the two other girls who were present in the condo.

The judge accepted that there were some discrepancies between the victim’s account in court and the statements she had given to the police. But she concluded that they did not detract from the credibility of the victim’s account of the overall sequence of events.

For example, the victim told police it was Raj Kumar who came up with the idea of having drinks, but in court, she said she was the one who wanted to drink alcohol.

Justice Chionh did not find this change of evidence to be detrimental to Raj Kumar. If anything, it made the victim’s account less favourable to herself, said the judge.

The two other girls also corroborated the victim’s testimony that after the rape, she had asked the girl who stayed downstairs why she did not help her.

They testified that the victim was in a state of considerable distress, appeared to be in pain, and was shivering, crying and mumbling.

Justice Chionh noted that there was no evidence of collusion among the three girls.

As for the delay in making a police report, the judge said given that the victim was on the run, it was understandable that she did not trust the authorities and was reluctant to seek help.

For the rape charge, Raj Kumar faces up to 20 years’ jail, and can also be fined or caned. For the outrage of modesty charge, he faces up to two years’ jail, a fine, and caning.