The Supreme Court on Monday refused to grant protection from arrest to newly elected Bahujan Samaj Party MP Atul Rai, who is an accused in a rape case. A vacation bench of Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi and Justice Aniruddha Bose said it was not inclined to entertain the plea, PTI reported.

On May 17, the court had refused to grant interim protection from arrest to Rai, the joint Samajwadi Party-Bahujan Samaj Party candidate from Ghosi Lok Sabha constituency in Uttar Pradesh.

Rai is accused of raping a college student from Varanasi. The college student had filed a first information report against Rai on May 1, alleging that he took her home on the pretext of meeting his wife, but then sexually assaulted her. Rai has denied the allegations, and has been on the run since the FIR was the filed.

The Ghosi constituency voted on May 19. Rai’s counsel had asked the court to provide him interim protection from arrest till May 23, the day of the results.

“It is not a case for quashing,” the court had said. “Fight it out. Fight the election and this case too.” The vacation bench of Justices Indira Banerjee and Sanjiv Khanna said the defendant had not filed documents. The bench had also refused to accept the argument of Rai’s counsel that the case was “politically motivated”. “This is very vague,” the judges had said.