A BANGLADESHI student made up a story about being raped, beaten and imprisoned because she thought it would win her an indefinite stay in the UK, a jury was told today.

Abdul Hanif told Bradford Crown Court he had treated the young woman well. He loved her and wanted to marry her so he was very surprised when police officers came to his place of work to arrest him.

Hanif, 30, of Chapel Lane, Allerton, Bradford, denies three sample charges of rape and one offence of assault occasioning actual bodily harm.

The jury has heard that police broke down the door of a flat in Thorpe Edge, Bradford, in June last year to free the woman, who came to the UK in 2009 to do an accountancy course.

Hanif, who worked at McDonald's in Girlington, Bradford, is accused of repeatedly raping her and throttling her with the cord off a mobile phone charger.

The 26-year-old woman alleges he drove her to Bradford without her permission and forced her to cook and clean for him for three months while abusing her.

Hanif told the court he first met the woman at her sister's home. He agreed to marry her but his family objected.

They kept in touch and he rescued her from a forced marriage by taking her from a house in London to Bradford.

They were homeless and slept in his car in Barkerend.

He tried to get them housed and when that failed they went to stay with friends before renting the flat.

Hanif said the Muslim woman was a virgin but he never forced her to have sex, she was keener than him.

A week before his arrest, he told her he had a gambling addiction and could not afford to send money to her family in Bangladesh.

"She went crazy. She said it was a dirty sickness that never goes from a person," he said.

He pulled her phone charger from the socket during the row but did not assault her with it.

Hanif denied taking the woman's phone away but said she did the cooking because he did not know how to.

He was planning to get a holy man to marry them.

She had kissed him goodbye and waved as he left for work that day.

Asked by his barrister, Geraldine Kelly, why he thought the woman had made up the allegations, Hanif replied: "She probably wanted an indefinite stay in this country."

The jury is expected to begin considering its verdicts tomorrow.