Kottayam: The Additional District and Sessions Court - I Kottayam has dismissed the discharge petition filed by Bishop Franco Mulakkal, who is accused of raping a nun.

The court said the bishop should stand for trial in the case.

The bishop's lawyer said an appeal would be filed in the High Court against the lower court order.

In the discharge petition filed in January this year, the bishop had requested the court to discharge him from the case without even stepping into the hearing as the nun had fabricated a story out of her personal grudge to him.

The prosecution had filed its objection to the plea filed by the bishop, accused of raping and sexually assaulting a nun of the same diocese.

The bishop had filed the plea just ahead of commencement of the preliminary hearing on charges against him in January this year.

Bishop Franco was arrested by the police in 2019 for allegedly raping a nun.

The Bishop was charged with wrongful confinement, rape, unnatural sex and criminal intimidation.

In her complaint, the nun had alleged that she was repeatedly raped by the Bishop between 2014 and 2016 at a convent in Kuravilangad in Kottayam.