Satara (Maharashtra), Mar 29 (IANS): Two more women have accused Marathi writer Laxman Mane of raping them, police said Thursday. Earlier, three women alleged he had sexually assaulted them.

Mane is absconding since he was booked Tuesday on the allegations of the three women working in a school run by him in Jakatwadi village in Satara district, around 250 km from Mumbai.

"Of the two new complainants who came forward late Wednesday, one is a cook and the other was a peon in the school. Mane is absconding and police teams are investigating the matter," an officer from Taluka Police Station told IANS.

Mane, 63, a former Maharashtra legislative council member, has now been charged with raping five women working at his residential school for tribal children in Satara.

Mane was honoured with a Padma Shri by the central government four years ago.

According to police, three married women aged between 30 and 35 Monday alleged that the writer raped them on the pretext of making them permanent employees of the school.

They claimed that he raped them between 2003 and 2010 in the school, at his home in Satara and at a guest house in Pune.

After booking Mane for rape, police teams visited his home and other places, but so far he is untraceable.

Mane's family stoutly denied the allegations and said he was being framed.

Mane also won the Sahitya Akademi award for his autobiography "Upara" in 1981.