Dehradun, May 16 (IANS): Senior Samajwadi Party (SP) leader and former Uttar Pradesh Minister Mool Chand Chauhan has been sent to judicial custody by an Uttarakhand court on charges of kidnapping and coercion, the police said on Tuesday.

The former minister and three of his aides surrendered in the court of the Chief Judicial Magistrate (CJM) in Paudhi, which rejected their bail plea and sent them to judicial custody.

There was a non-bailable warrant (NBW) against the former minister.

The three-time legislator has been accused of kidnapping Bijnore District Panchayat members in Uttar Pradesh and coercing them to vote for the party candidate during the Panchayat polls in 2013, the police said.

Many of these members were staying at a hotel in Lakshman Jhula police station area on January 17, 2013, when Chauhan is said to have come with his henchmen in red-beacon fitted cars and kidnapped them.

Bijnore resident Rohit Kumar had filed a police complaint about the incident with the Lakshman Jhula police station the following day.

The police had registered a case against 10 persons but despite court summons they never came to the court, forcing issuance of a non-bailable arrest warrant against them.

On Monday, Chauhan along with Bijnore District Cooperative Bank chairman Amit Chauhan, SP leaders Rasheed and Kapil surrendered before CJM Sudhir Kumar Singh.

The CJM rejected their bail application and sent them to judicial custody.

Many other accused, including a former Samajwadi Party member of Parliament, are yet to surrender or appear before the court.