Pay maintenance or face jail: Court to 'Doosri Radha'

Lucknow, Nov 22 (UNI) A family court here today asked former IPS officer Devendra Kishore Panda alias 'Doosri Radha' to pay the maintenance money to his wife Veena by December 8 or be ready to spend a month in jail.

Ms Panda's counsel S C Srivastava here said the court had given Panda time till today to pay Rs 2,83,390 as maintenance to his client.

''But, Mr Panda deposited a cheque of Rs 1.50 lakh in the court on November 6. Today the court asked him to pay the remaining approximate Rs 1.33 lakh by December 8 or he could face a month's simple imprisonment,'' he explained.

While in 2004, Panda had filed for 'judicial separation', his wife had sought maintenance equivalent to one-third of her husband's emoluments.

The case of judicial separation is still pending as Panda is yet to pay the full maintenance amount to his wife.

Panda, a man entrusted with the task of maintaining law and order in the state, has been instead donning the role of Radha, consort of Lord Krishna, much to the angst of his wife, who moved the court against him.

Since 1991, the former Inspector General (Rules and Manuals) has donned the role of Radha and plunged into a pool of Krishna bhakti.

Dressed in female attire and sporting a Mangaltika (jewellery adorning the head of married Hindu women), a nose ring and vermillion (Sindoor), Panda spends most of his time dancing and singing bhajans supposed to have been sung by Radha for the Lord.

Panda says in 1991, he got the divine glimpse of Lord Krishna who told ''me I was in reality His beloved Radha''.

Since then, Mr Panda has been rewriting rules by playing the romantic character of Radha, much to the dismay of his wife Veena, whom he married in 1973.

She now terms him a dramatist and has secured from the Lucknow Bench of Allahabad High Court, a monthly maintenance of Rs 7,000 from Panda.

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