Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church priest Job Mathew was arrested on Thursday soon after he surrendered before the Kollam Crime Branch in Kerala in connection with a rape and molestation case, PTI reported.

Mathew is the second accused in the case. Last week, the Kerala Police Crime Branch had booked four priests of the church on charges of rape and molestation. On Wednesday, the Kerala High Court dismissed anticipatory bail pleas filed by three of them, including Mathew.

Police are looking for Sony Varghese and Jaise K George, the other two priests whose pleas were rejected.

The priests have been accused of blackmailing and sexually abusing the woman for three years. In a letter to the church in June, the woman’s husband, from Tiruvalla in Pathanamthitta district, claimed that the priests used his wife’s confession, which is meant to be a secret under church laws, to blackmail her. He named eight people in the letter and sought action against them.

Following the allegations, the church sent the priests on leave last week. The National Commission for Women on Wednesday wrote to the Kerala police chief seeking an investigation.

Veteran Communist Party of India (Marxist) leader and chairperson of the Kerala Administrative Reforms Commission V S Achuthanandan and the National Commission for Women had written to State DGP Loknath Behara, demanding an inquiry into the charges.

Another case of alleged rape

On Tuesday, the Kerala Police filed a rape case against Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church priest Binu George. A woman accused Binu George of sexually assaulting her at a church office in Alappuzha district when she met him to seek help on a family dispute in 2014.

The woman told the police that church authorities assured her that she would not face any harassment from him in the future. They also transferred the priest to another parish, but he allegedly continued to send her lewd messages, The Indian Express reported. She then decided to approach the police.

“We had transferred him out of the complainant’s parish as a punishment,” Malankara Church priests trustee Father MO John told The Indian Express. “What the church could do then was only transfer the priest. Now, we may take harsher decisions, including defrocking, since he is facing a criminal case.”

A team led by district crime records bureau Deputy Superintendent of Police Sivaprasad has started an investigation based on the woman’s complaint, police officials told Scroll.in on Wednesday. The case was filed on Monday.