Councillor charged with polygamy

SURABAYA, East Java: Military prosecutors charged an East Java deputy councillor from the National Police and the Indonesian Military (TNI) with forging documents and polygamy.

Col. Masduki, 54, forged his marriage documents to marry 32- year-old Indah Sulistyowati, said military prosecutor Col. Salamun during the opening session of the trial on Thursday.

Polygamy is not allowed for military personnel. Salamun said that Masduki married Indah in 1996, although he was still married to Linda Yun Aripurawanti and a father of three children.

Masduki met Indah when he taught at a military school in Bandung, West Java. "His acquaintance with the witness (Indah), a senior student of his, continued with courting and marriage," the prosecutor said.

Masduki married Indah under a false name, claiming to be an entrepreneur whose wife had passed. The illegal marriage went unnoticed for four years until March 2000 when Linda found out.

When confronted Masduki choose to divorce Indah, with whom he had two children, aged one and two. -- Antara