Congress leader Supriya Shrinate on Monday accused BJP IT cell head Amit Malviya of sexual assault of women and demanded the saffron party to sack the leader.

Addressing a press conference, she said, “An RSS member Santanu Sinha, related to BJP leader Rahul Sinha, has said that the BJP IT cell head Amit Malviya indulged in nefarious activities. He indulged in the sexual exploitation of women, not just in 5-star hotels but in BJP offices in West Bengal.

“The reality is less than 24 hours after Prime Minister Narendra Modi was sworn in, serious charges of sexual exploitation have been leveled against a very prominent office bearer of the BJP, the head of its IT cell,” she said, calling for the BJP to immediately remove Malviya from his post.

Meanwhile, Malviya has filed a defamation suit of Rs 10 crore against RSS member Santanu Sinha over the accusations leveled against the former.

“The nature of the allegation is extremely offensive in as much as, they falsely allege sexual misconduct purportedly committed by my client. The same is fatally injurious to the dignity and reputation of my client who, by virtue of his professional profile, is a public figure,” his counsel said.

The notice asked Sinha to take down the social media post in which he had made the allegations.

Many opposition parties demanded that Malviya, the BJP’s Information Technology Cell leader and co-in-charge of the party’s West Bengal state unit, be removed from his posts.

The Congress also demanded an “independent probe” into the matter. It further accused Modi of providing “political patronage to the perpetrators of crime”.

“If you remember the IIT-BHU gangrape and the three people involved — Saksham Patel, Kunal Pander, and Anand Chauhan — are all extremely close to the senior leaders of the BJP, including Modi,” Shrinate said.

She also urged the National Commission for Women (NCW) to intervene, saying, “We hope that the new Minister of Women and Child Development is not going to be a mute bystander to women’s plight. We hope that NCW will find their voice, conscience, and morality and take suo moto cognizance of this matter.”