Malaysian TikTokker who faced rape threats found dead in condominium

A Malaysian social media influencer and activist lodged a police report on Thursday expressing fears of being raped and killed before being found dead in her condominium.

Rajeswary Appahu, 30, a Hindu rights activist, had named two individuals in her report, lodged at the Dang Wangi police station in Kuala Lumpur, alleging they were tormenting her by trolling her on social media platform TikTok.

In her main report, sighted by The Star, Rajeswary claimed she was trolled and harassed in a live session with threats and vulgarity by an individual on TikTok.

Rajeswary, who is known as Esha on social media, said the person had used her photo and made several threats to “rape and kill” her as well as “injure” her.

“He said that he had a gang to back him up and also encouraged his followers to forward the live session [link] to me,” Rajeswary stated in the report.

Besides the alleged perpetrator’s sexual and lewd comments, she said many of those watching the session had also levelled abuse against her.

Rajeswary was one of the organisers of the mass recital of the Kanda Shasti hymn at the Batu Caves Sri Subramaniar Swamy Temple in Selangor state last month.

Her distraught father P. Appahu, 62, who is a temple caretaker, said: “She was a very strong person. I can’t understand why this happened.’’

Meanwhile, Communications Minister Fahmi Fadzil said he will meet with TikTok representatives next week to discuss the governance of the social media platform.

Other agencies such as the Malaysian Communication and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) and the Attorney General’s Chambers (AGC) will also be in attendance, he said.

“Even though we have repeatedly reminded the public to be careful about the things they upload so that something like this would