In a shocking turn of events in the rape case against BJP leader Chinmayanand, the Allahabd High Court has granted him bail, even as it cast aspersions on the intentions and actions of the survivor. A 23-year-old law student had accused Chinmayanand of prolonged sexual exploitation while she was a student of an institute run by him.

But the shocking judgment delivered by Justice Rahul Chaturvedi makes several comments that could be construed as survivor shaming. The order reads, “A girl, whose virginity is at stake, not uttering a single word to her own parent or before the Court regarding the alleged incident, is an astonishing conduct which speak volumes about the ingeniousness of the prosecution story.”

The judgment also says, “It is also noticeable that there is also nothing on record that during the period of the alleged atrocities committed upon Miss “A” she made any complaint or even any whisper to her family members against the accused applicant, therefore, at this juncture, this Court draws its conclusion that it was a complete matter of quid pro quo but over a span of time the greed for extracting “more”, she along with her accomplices seems to have advanced for hatching a conspiracy against the applicant and tried to black mail him for ransom, through the obscenic video clips recorded by herself.”

Not only does this play into the cultural obsession with virginity, but also presumes that the survivor was in a state of mind to share the story of her abuse with parents in a conservative country where any conversations about sex, let alone sexual assault are either discouraged or carried out in hushed tones, thereby adding elements of shame to the narrative. It also completely disregards how the girl was allegedly constantly under surveillance and was taken to Chinmayananda by his hired muscle men. She could only get her story out when she managed to get away from her alleged abuser.

Comments on survivor’s relationship with her father

The order also makes some rather odd remarks about the survivor’s father saying, “It appears from the text of the FIR, lodged by father that there was no direct contact between the daughter and her father. The relationship between father and the daughter seems to be quite strange as they were having no direct contacts and were alien to each other and the father was taking stock of the situation of his daughter through her facebook account.”

It goes on to say, “The gist and substance of CC No. 442 of 2019, lodged on 25.08.2019 derives that it was got registered as a contrivance only to malign the stature and status to the extent of assassination of the applicant’s character. Fortifying the aforesaid narratives of the allegations, it is contended that soon thereafter sensing some rat in the dirty ragged story, father of Miss “A”- ****** lodged CC No. 445 of 2019 on 27.08.2019 in a foxy manner and design, two days after the aforesaid FIR, enrolling applicant as accused and slapping all sort of malicious allegations upon him to reduce his high reputation into ashes. To build up mountain of his argument, learned counsel for the applicant submitted that the complainant of the aforesaid FIR, even has diced his daughter Miss “A” to win the dirty game for the sake of monetary and material gains.”

This not only shames the survivor, but also casts aspertions on her father’s intentions. This once again plays into the narrative popularised by misogynists that rape cases are just a means for women to extort money from men. 

Brief background of the case

On September 20, self-proclaimed holy man, former Union Minister and BJP MP Chinmayanand, was arrested and remanded to judicial custody following allegations of sexual exploitation by a female student of an educational institution run by him.

The accusations were made by a law student from Chinmayanand’s SS Law College in a video she posted on social media on August 23. He was arrested on charges of stalking, criminal intimidation, wrongful confinement and sexual intercourse by a person in authority (Section 376C).  

But the accused made counter allegations of blackmail against the survivor and merely a day after a local court agreed to hear her plea for protection from arrest, the survivor was arrested.

The entire bail order may be read here:

Related:

Who is Chinmayanada?
Law student sent to judicial custody after accusing Chinmayananda of Sexual Exploitation
Oppn slams BJP for selective targeting of Rape Survivor in Chinmayanand Case

The post Chinmayanand granted bail, did judge shame survivor? appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The case against Chinmayanand, a three-time MP of the BJP and a former union minister and “guru” to many leading the present UP regime is the most recent example. The details of the case are well known and need not be repeated here. It was believed that after the Supreme Court intervention on the letter petition filed by public-spirited lawyer Shobha Gupta and the setting up of a special investigation team to be monitored by a designated bench of the Allahabad High Court, the young woman from Shahjahanpur would get justice.

But this has not happened. The 22-year-old, who says she is a survivor of rape, is herself in jail. She is accused of extortion under IPC sections 385/ 507/ 201. All of these sections are bailable. Even as her case for bail was listed, the SIT team arrived at her home early on Wednesday morning and dragged her to a waiting jeep, traumatized and terrified. When her case came up for hearing, she was denied bail. It was found that the SIT had deliberately added another section. 67A under the IT Act which is non-bailable.

Yesterday, I travelled with my colleague Subhashini Ali and a team of activists from the All India Democratic Women’s Association to Shahjahanpur where we met her parents, lawyers and the SIT officers. I met the student in jail along with her mother and brother.

What we found was the blatant misuse of power to protect the accused in a rape case. Regretfully, the most well-intentioned orders of the Supreme Court have been used as an excuse to limit the scope of the investigation. It has been a step-by-step process. But the most important fact to emerge is that there has been no FIR filed on the complaint of rape which was registered by the Delhi police on September 7. She was traced and brought to Delhi on the orders of the Supreme Court. In Delhi, she gave a detailed complaint of the horror she underwent from the first time she was raped, reportedly by the accused Chinmayanand, in October 2018 till August of this year. She gave the names of those who had conspired with him to enable the sexual assaults. Her complaint was forwarded by the Delhi police to the SIT which confirms having received the complaint on September 8. However, till today, no FIR has been filed by the SIT on her complaint. In fact, this complaint does not figure at all in the investigations being conducted by the SIT.

When we met the officers of the SIT in their office yesterday, we inquired why an FIR was not filed on the student’s complaint. Surely this should have been the basis of their investigation, we asked. Their reply was “We have no locus standi to file any fresh FIRs. The Supreme Court in its orders has specifically asked us to investigate FIR 442 and FIR 445. So our investigations are only on these FIRs.”

These two FIRs are on entirely different issues and have nothing to do with the charge of rape. One of the FIRs (445) was filed by the father when he found his daughter missing soon after she posted a video alleging that she was being threatened and her life, and those of other young women like her, were being ruined by a “swamy”. At that time, the distraught father, linking “swamy” to Chinmayanand since his daughter was studying in an institution owned by him, filed a complaint that he suspected she had been kidnapped by Chinmayanand. The second FIR 442, was filed by Chinmayanand’s lawyer, alleging that Chinmayanand had received extortion threats on his mobile phone demanding a payment of five crores.

When the Supreme Court was to give its order on September 5, the government’s lawyer informed the court that there were two FIRs registered, 442 and 445. He did not mention that the woman’s complaint had not yet been registered. The Supreme Court ordered that the SIT should investigate both FIRs. Nowhere did the court say that her complaint should not be registered as an FIR or that no fresh FIRs germane to the case should not be registered, but that is the extraordinary interpretation made by the SIT of the court order. In its status report filed before the special bench of the Allahabad High Court, which is supposed to monitor the case, the SIT makes absolutely no mention of the girl’s complaint of rape. On its part, the High Court accepted the status report at face value. In the light of such a blatant omission, the concept of “monitoring” by a bench of the High Court especially set up for the purpose, surely needs clarification.
When we further asked the SIT officers whether, in the light of their interpretation of the limited scope of the Supreme Court order, they had passed on the woman’s complaint to the local police and administration to register an FIR, they said it was not “their mandate.” In other words, neither are they acting on her complaint nor have they asked anyone else to do so. Thus the main issue of the rape of a young woman has been eliminated by the SIT. In legal papers, her voice is silenced, she does not exist except as an extortionist. In the meanwhile in every press conference being held the SIT focuses entirely on the issue of extortion, damning the girl. So, while sabotaging the legal aspect, at the same time public perception is sought to be influenced against the girl.

What of the man she has accused? Chinmayanand was arrested on September 20 on the charge of 376c This concerns the abuse of a position of authority to “induce a person to have sexual intercourse” not amounting to rape. The SIT came to this conclusion in the course of their investigation into the charge of extortion. In the words of a senior officer of the SIT, “In one case, the girl is the victim and in the other, the accused. We have taken into account both cases.”

Many decades ago, when we were fighting for justice in the Mathura rape case, the guilty police personnel claimed that the girl had no marks of injuries on her body which proved that it was not rape but consensual intercourse. At that time, the Supreme Court had upheld this perverted reasoning which takes violent sexual assault out of the context in which the victim finds herself. It took several years of hard struggle to get the law changed. Today, in 2019, the Chinmayanand case shows that de-contextualisation of rape and sexual assault and a total ignorance or insensitivity of the condition of a rape victim and her subsequent actions remains deeply ingrained in the minds of those expected to bring justice to the victim.

Even if we accept the case of extortion against the girl, can rape be equated with the accusation of extortion as done in the approach of the SIT? What was the context in which a young woman denied justice acts in a particular way? If she is guilty of extortion, does it mean that she was not a victim of violent rape? We asked these questions of the SIT members. They did not have much to say on this aspect. They did reiterate that they had consulted the legal department before filing the cases.

A grave injustice is being committed right before our eyes. Eight years ago, Chinmayanand was accused of rape by an inmate of one of his ashrams and a case of rape was filed against him in November 2011. The complaint was that he had held her captive and she had been assaulted for several years. When the Adityanath government came to power, it made a request before the CJM of Shahjahanpur to withdraw the case of rape against Chinmayanand. The CJM refused and issued a warrant against him. The case went to the High Court which granted a stay on Chinmayanand’s arrest.

In the current case, the woman was just 21 when she was first assaulted. She did what she did to save herself. She showed courage in taking him on, knowing that the system was in his support. Today, she is being taught that you cannot challenge a rapist when he is a VIP. Everything is being done to break her spirit. What is the message being sent to other victims of rape and sexual abuse and assault? Stay silent, otherwise you will end up in jail. She wept on the shoulder of her younger brother when we were permitted to meet her in jail. She showed him bruises on her arms when she had been grabbed by the policewomen who had come to arrest her. She said she felt humiliated. What about me, she said, what about what I have suffered. He consoled her with the news that there are many people who support her struggle for justice. She brightened up and reiterated her resolve to get justice.

Brinda Karat is a Politburo member of the CPI(M) and a former Member of the RajyaSabha
 
 

The post I feel humiliated, says jailed student fighting Chinmayanand appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra on Thursday asked if this is the “BJP’s justice”.

The law student was arrested on Wednesday on charges of extortion and sent to 14-day judicial custody. Hours later, her bail plea was rejected, while the ‘Swami’ who has been a three times union minister in successive BJP governments, is in hospital! Earlier women’s organisations in UP had held vociferous street protests on the issue.Following the uproar, Chinmayanand was finally also arrested, but charges of rape have not yet been brought against him.  He is currently undergoing treatment at Sanjay Gandhi Post Graduate Institute of Medical Sciences in Lucknow.

Priyanka Gandhi posted a tweet in which she said that in the cases of the Unnao and Shahjahanpur rapes, the police have delayed action against the accused, both of whom are BJP leaders. Only after public pressure were they arrested, the Congress general secretary in-charge of eastern UP.

“Unnao rape case: Victim’s father is killed. Victim’s uncle is arrested. Following massive public pressure and after 13 months, accused MLA arrested. Attempt to kill the victim’s family. Shahjahanpur rape case: Victim arrested. Victim’s family being pressured,” Priyanka Gandhi said in a tweet.

“Even the charge of rape has not been put on the accused BJP leader [Chinmayanand]. Is this BJP’s justice?” she said.

Chinmayanand, who was sent to judicial custody after his arrest, was booked under section 376C (taking advantage of his official position to have sexual intercourse) of the IPC, a charge that will attract lesser punishment than rape. The 72-year-old is a three-time BJP MP and was a minister of state for home during the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government.

On Thursday, Brinda Karat of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) isited the Shahjahanpur jail. She told the media that she had discussed the case with the woman’s family and promised to help them. She also visited met SIT officials. She questioned why the woman was sent to jail for a bailable offence, calling the act “inhuman”.

Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav also came down on the BJP for the arrest. “BJP has revealed its real face by sending the daughter, who mustered the courage to raise her voice against a BJP leader, to jail. Today every daughter, sister, and mother in the country is saddened by this shameless act and some people are saying ‘Everything is fine in the country’. Condemnable! The slogan of ‘Beti Bachao’ too has turned out to be a jumla after all,” the former chief minister tweeted on Thursday.

According to Hindustan Times, the woman’s family reiterated that they did not try to extort the BJP leader. “My daughter has not confessed to anything. She was arrested to put pressure on her and weaken her case against Chinmayanand. We just want to appeal to the government to ensure that justice is done in the case,” said the father. They said Chinmayanand was being ‘pampered’ at the hospital.

Hospital authorities have defended his hospitalisation, claiming that the former Union minister was still complaining of “severe weakness and urinary problems”. “He is under observation and undergoing further investigations for his diabetic and urinary problems,” the hospital said.

The BJP, meanwhile, claimed that the leader was not a member of the party anymore. Speaking to the media, party spokesperson Harish Shrivastava said, “He is not a BJP member and the law will take its course against him.”The spokesperson did not provide any information as to when he stopped being a party member. “I think for a long time. Right after he fought elections and became a minister? It’s not a question of documents and we cannot give an exact date but Chinmayanand is not a member of the BJP.”

In the Unnao case too, the BJP had claimed that the accused MLA Kuldeep Singh Sengar had been suspended “a long time ago” from the party, despite media reports showing otherwise. He was formally expelled from the party on August 1, after intense public pressure accusing the party of supporting the rape and murder accused leader.

Related Articles:
1. ‘Swamy’ turns slimy: Chinmayanand’s fall from grace
2.Political Vendetta? Law student sent to Judicial custody after accusing Min. of Sexual Exploitation
 

The post Oppn slams BJP for selective targeting of Rape Survivor in Chinmayanand Case appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Image Courtesy: nationalheraldindia.com

The BJP ‘stalwart’ and former Union Minister Chinmayanand was arrested on charges of stalking, criminal intimidation, wrongful confinement and sexual intercourse by a person in authority (Section 376C) last Friday. The BJP, which otherwise makes a lot of hue a cry when it’s to blame matters on leaders who aren’t even alive, has not uttered a single word on this conduct, officially. The women ministers of the party, occupying responsible positions, who have been seen as the ‘torch bearers’ of ‘women empowerment’ (person in reference Smriti Irani), have not commented at all on the issue, nor have shown any visible support for the clearly vulnerable law student who accused the minister of rape. The Uttar Pradesh (UP) police also delayed arresting the minister and hasn’t, to date, added charges of rape to this case. Yesterday, women’s organisations in Lucknow led a street protest against the charges of ‘extortion’ against the survivor, while the former BJP union minister Chinmanyanand, a rape accused was ‘allowed’ by the court to be in hospital though he was arrested!

After remaining silent on the whole issue for about a month now, suddenly the BJPannouncedon Thursday that the former Union minister is “no longer a member of the party.” BJP spokesperson Harishchandra Srivastava told PTI, “He is not a member of the BJP”.

However, the spokesperson failed to specify the time when such a decision was taken to remove Chinmayanand from the party. A three-time Lok Sabha MP from Jaunpur, he is also the president of the management committee of the Swami Sukhdevanand Post Graduate College (SSPG), where the 23-year-old law student studied. The reasons given by Srivastava for not being more specific about the details of the decision, are ambiguous too. “All our records are now digitised and so we cannot tell since when he has been discontinued as a member of the party,” he said.

Chinmayanand has been in the party since the 70s and was elected to the 13^th Lok Sabha from Jaunpur seat in UP. He has been a minister of state for home in the Atal Bihari Vajpayee-led BJP government. He even won general elections from Badaun in 1991 and from Machhlishahr in 1998.

Reportedly, the Akhara Parishad is also planning to expel Chinmayanand from the body at its meeting in Haridwar on October 10. The Parishad is based on the system of Akharas in the Hindu society. An Akhara literally means a wrestling ring in Hindi, but also stands for a place of debate. There are 14 such organisations based on the form of Hinduism and Hindu philosophy they adhere to. Most Akharas are Vaishnavas (followers of Lord Vishnu) and Shaivism (followers of Lord Shiva).

Akhil Bharatiya Akhara Parishad (ABAP) president Narendra Giri told PTI, “In most of the cases like this, the seer is expelled from the Akhara Parishad until he is proven innocent.”Giri said that the 72-year-old Swami Chinmayanand belonged to the Prayagraj-based Mahanirvani Akhara.
Notably, before the ‘Swami’s’ deeds came into public eyes, last year, UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath had ordered the withdrawal of a rape and kidnapping case lodged against Chinmayanand by a disciple and manager of Mumukshu Ashram run by him.

However, the chief judicial magistrate, district court, Shahjahanpur, had stalled the withdrawal proceedings after objections from the victim. The manager of the Mumukshu Ashram had filed an FIR against Chinmayanand on November 30, 2011, alleging that she was held captive, raped and assaulted for several years.

Congress alleges support to the rapist Minister

The Congress on Thursday accused UP BJP government of supporting former Minister Chinmayanand and questioned the silence of women leaders of the party and Prime Minister Narendra Modi.Congress General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra had alleged that both, the government and the UP police were repeating the ‘negligence’ shown and ‘protection’ given to the accused in the Unnao rape case.

She highlighted that “the consequences of the BJP government and police’s negligence andprotection of the accused in the Unnao rape case are in front of everyone.” She added, “Now, the BJP government and police are repeating the same in the Shahjahanpur case. The victim is in fear. But do not know what the BJP government is waiting for”.

Congress spokesperson Sharmishtha Mukherjee said that ‘inaction’ against Mr Chinmayanand is proof that the BJP is standing behind him. She said, “This is a very serious issue. It has become very clear that this government has a very non-serious approach to tackling increasing crimes against women. The government has a completely blind eye towards crimes against women and they are instead protecting their leaders,” and asked if this case too will be handled like the Unnao rape case.

The rise of Chinmayanand

The three time parliamentarian is currently the president of the managing committee of Swami Sukhdevanand Post Graduate College located in Shahjahanpur. He also ‘looks after’ the management of the Mumukshu trust located in the same region.

Chinmayanand started his political career with the Jayprakash Narayan’s movement. As the movement got the support from prominent leaders, he became an instant favourite with the Jan Sangh, the political arm of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) which was then preceded by BJP. It was 1980s then. The efforts to build the Ram Temple were gaining momentum. By this time, Chinmayanand had gained importance among the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) leaders. So, he became one of the leading faces of the Ram Mandir temple building propaganda.
By 1985, the ‘movement’ to build the temple was at its peak. By this time, Chinmayanand had established himself as an important Hindutva politician. It is around this time that he came in touch with Yogi Adityanath’s teacher Mahant Avaidyanath. Chinmayanand, along with Avidyanath started the Ram Mandir Mukti Yagya Samiti. It was then that Adityanath and Chinmayanand’s relationship was strengthened.

And hence, when in 1991, Atal Bihari Vapayee became the PM, Chinmayanand got the ticket for UP’s Baduan for the first time. Despite him having no connection with Badaun, merely on the basis of his ‘campaign’ to build the Ram Temple, he won the election and became a parliamentarian. Afterwards, in 1998 he was elected from Machhlishahr and 1999 from Jaunpur. 2003 is considered crucial for Chinmayanand.

This was because, for the first time in the history of India, a ‘sadhu’ (‘saint’) had been elevated to the position of a Home Minister. He would report directly to Advani in 2004.

Adityanath and Chinmayanand’s relationship is neither hidden nor a secret from anyone. In 2017 when the BJP won election in UP, the question was who should become the CM. It was Chinmayanand, who like a good ‘guru brother’ suggested Adityanath’s name.

No wonder then that the Yogi chief minister appears clueless about how to deal with the ‘phenomenon’ that is Chinmayanand!

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https://sabrangindia.in/article/fb-video-missing-student-what-has-transpired-chinmayanand-case
https://sabrangindia.in/article/court-breather-student-who-accused-bjps-chinmayanand-rape
https://sabrangindia.in/article/political-vendetta-law-student-sent-judicial-custody-after-accusing-min-sexual-exploitation
 

The post ‘Swamy’ turns slimy: Chinmayanand’s fall from grace appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Image Courtesy: PTI

The Shahjahanpur law student, who accused the BJP minister Chinmayanand of rape and sexual exploitation, has been arrested in the extortion case against her, merely a day after a local court agreed to hear her plea for protection from arrest.

She has been sent to judicial custody for 14 days. She was arrested from her house by the Special Investigation Team (SIT) of the Uttar Pradesh (UP) police on Wednesday morning at around 9.15 am and taken for medical examination, as per the team. They added that she will be produced before the court later in the day.

On Tuesday, reportedly she faced questioning by the SIT set up by the Uttar Pradesh police under the directions of the Supreme Court. The 23-year-old woman was on her way to the court in UP’s Shahjahanpur for protection from arrest when reportedly, the police intercepted her, took her outside and made her sit in a vehicle, sources said.

On Tuesday, the court also rejected the bail application of three men, Sanjay, Sachin and Vikram who had been arrested on extortion charges filed by the BJP minister.

Sachin and Vikram were taken on remand for 95 hours for taking them to site recovery of a mobile phone allegedly used in making the extortion demand, sources from the team said.

As per the sources, the accused had told the SIT that they had thrown the mobile phone, which was used to make the alleged extortion call, near MehandipurBalaji in Rajasthan.

Earlier, the SIT had arrested the three on charges of trying to extort money from Chinmayanand and named an unidentified woman as a suspect in the same case. Sources also said, the SIT has also sent the Chinmayanand lawyer’s mobile phone, on which the alleged extortion message was sent, for forensic examination, the sources said.

The BJP minister and former union minister was arrested on last Friday, days after the law student testified in court and close to a month after the allegations first surfaced. The court has denied him bail and told him to approach the Sessions court.

Chinmayanand has been charged with “misusing authority for sexual intercourse” or “sexual intercourse not amounting to the offence of rape”, according to his lawyer.

The law student had been trying to file a rape complaint for almost a month but the UP police refused to do so. Once arrested, apparently, he has been not charged with rape still. The only charges the police did file was that of kidnapping and intimidation, which the woman’s family had alleged after she went missing.

He was finally arrested a day after UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, at a press conference on his government’s half-way mark, claimed that women’s safety was a priority for him and crime had dropped since he came to power at the head of a BJP government.

The 23-year-old woman, a student at a law college that Chinmayanand runs, on Monday went to a court protected by over 50 police personnel and recorded her statement in the court of the chief judicial magistrate.

It is curious to note that in a case where sexual exploitation by a person in power is a much graver charge, the SIT is showing more keenness in attacking the student who alleged of such a conduct by the minister.

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https://sabrangindia.in/article/fb-video-missing-student-what-has-transpired-chinmayanand-case

The post Political Vendetta? Law student sent to Judicial custody after accusing Min. of Sexual Exploitation appeared first on SabrangIndia.

 
Image Courtesy: NDTV.com

The law student who accused BJP’s Chinmayanand of rape and sexual exploitation, in a curiously strange turn of events, is facing an investigation for alleged extortion. And today, news surfaced that the student has been arrested. However, in what may come as a breather for her, the court agreed to hear her request for protection from arrest. A court in Uttar Pradesh will hear her petition on September 26, Thursday.

The news came for the woman amid reports that she may have been taken by the police for questioning after she was charged with extortion. Her lawyer, Anoop Trivedi said, “The media was broadcasting wrong news that the girl was arrested. We have not been given any notice,” said the woman’s lawyer Anoop Trivedi.

The 23-year-old woman was on her way to the court in UP’s Shahjahanpur for protection from arrest when reportedly, the police intercepted her, took her outside and made her sit in a vehicle, sources said.

The law student is seen walking out of the court in some visuals, flanked by a large number of policemen and a woman officer of the Special Investigation Team (SIT) that had been constituted to investigate the allegations against Chinmayanand, a former union minister. She had accused that he blackmailed her, forced her to give him massages and raped her for a year.

The minister’s lawyer Om Singh, however, repeated his claims of a conspiracy and extortion, “I have been saying from day 1, that the video uploaded by the woman on Facebook, it has connections to extortion against Chinmayanand… I just cannot understand why she has not been arrested yet. She will go to jail, of that I am sure,” he said.

The BJP minister was arrested on last Friday, days after the law student testified in court and close to a month after the allegations first surfaced. The court has denied him bail and told him to approach the Sessions court.

Chinmayanand has been charged with “misusing authority for sexual intercourse” or “sexual intercourse not amounting to the offence of rape”, according to his lawyer.

The law student had been trying to file a rape complaint for almost a month but the UP police refused to do so. Once arrested, apparently, he has been not charged with rape still. The only charges the police did file was that of kidnapping and intimidation, which the woman’s family had alleged after she went missing.

He was finally arrested a day after UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, at a press conference on his government’s half-way mark, claimed that women’s safety was a priority for him and crime had dropped since he came to power at the head of a BJP government.

The 23-year-old woman, a student at a law college that Chinmayanand runs, on Monday went to a court protected by over 50 police personnel and recorded her statement in the court of the chief judicial magistrate.

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https://sabrangindia.in/article/who-chinmayananda
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The post UP: Court breather for student who accused BJP’s Chinmayanand of Rape appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)’s Chinmayanand, accused of rape by a law student, was finally arrested on Friday, September 20, five days after the survivor elaborated the incident of sexual assist that she faced for over a year. In the period she also faced blackmail. She submitted the incident before a court. It’s been close to a month after the allegations first surfaced.
 

Media reports coming in late on Friday evening state that even now, the former union minister, Chinmayanand, has been charged not with rape but the watered down “misusing authority for sexual intercourse” or “sexual intercourse not amounting to the offence of rape”, which carries a punishment of up to five years in jail and a fine. But what is shocking is that the woman student who has accused the union minister has also been booked in a criminal case: of extortion!

Just two day before, the survivor accused the Uttar Pradesh government for their lax attitude towards the accused and had asked, “Will they believe me if I kill myself?” Here is a day by day account of what transpired in the case.

August 23, 2019:Law student uploads a video on her Facebook profile in which she accused Former Union Minister Chinmayanand of rape and asks PM Narendra Modi and UP CM Yogi Adityanath to help

August 24, 2019:Law student goes missing

August 26, 2019: The search for the missing student starts on the basis of the complaint filed by father

August 27, 2019:As news of the student going missing gains traction, theSupreme Court takes the matter in its own hands, Chinmayanand is accused of kidnapping and intimidation

August 28, 2019:National Commission of Womentakes note of the matter and expresses concern,Opposition leader Priyanka Gandhi criticises BJP

August 29, 2019:Supreme Court issues orders for the student to be presented. Police releases poster of missing woman with her details

August 30, 2019: Police finds out the student from Rajasthan. She is presented in front of the Supreme Court

September 1, 2019: Police reaches Shahjahanpur for Chinmayanand’s statement, he is not found there

September 2, 2019: The survivor gives her statement in front of the Supreme Court (SC), SC directs U.P. to set up SIT to look into woman’s allegations and admission to a different school

September 4, 2019: Chinmanayanand dubs accusations against him as conspiracy

September 5, 2019: The survivor reports the incident at 0 number in Delhi, the case is transferred

September 6, 2019:SIT led by I.G. Naveen Arorareaches Shahjahanpur, talks to media, gathers papers

September 7, 2019: SIT visits the Law College and investigates

September 8, 2019: SIT calls the student, her father, friend to Police Line’s temporary office and does questioning

September 9, 2019: Studentfaces media and accuses Chinmayanand of sexual exploitation alleging that the DM had threatened her father

September 10, 2019:A video featuring a woman and an elderly has started doing rounds on social media.

September 11, 2019: Medical done for the survivor at Shahjahanpur Hospital

September 14, 2019: SIT questions the survivor’s mother, college staff and Chinmayanand’s personal staff. The student gives a pen drive containing 43 videos to support her allegations after she was asked by the SIT Saturday to submit whatever evidence she had

September 17, 2019: Law student askswhether only when she commits suicide the will accused be arrested

September 20, 2019: Chinmayanand is arrested

September 20,2019:The woman student who has accused the union minister has also been booked in a criminal case: of extortion!

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In the video the girl said, “A prominent leader of the ‘saint society’ has destroyed lives of several girls. He is now threatening my life. I have all the evidence.” She sought help from Prime Minister Modi and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minsiter Adityanath. She added, “He has threatened to kill my family too.” The very next day, the girl went missing from her hostel.

She resurfaced subsequently in Rajasthan after the Supreme Court took suo motu cognizance after lawyers raised concerns and asked the police to produce her. On September 30, judges heard her in a closed hearing. She has now submitted 40 video clips as evidence before the Special Investigation Team formed to probe the case. She also recorded a formal statement where she said that Chinmayanand had been sexually exploiting her for 9 months. She said he had raped her, made a video of the crime, made another video of her bathing, and blackmailed her with a video clip.

Confession and counter-allegations
After being taken into custody, Chinmayanand reportedly confessed to having sexual conversations with the girl and getting a ‘body massage’ from her. A video of the said body massage went viral on social media. Chinmayanand reportedly also said he was ashamed of himself for his conduct. He was booked under charges of stalking, criminal intimidation, wrongful confinement and sexual intercourse by a person in authority (section 376 C).

But in a cruel twist of fate, the girl in question has also been booked for ‘extortion’! She is accused of teaming up with three men; Sanjay Singh, Sachin Sengar and Vikram to extort Rs 5 crore from Chinmayanand. All three have been arrested.

So, who exactly is Chinmayanand. From where does he get his power, and whose patronage does he enjoy to be able to confess to his crime and yet have the victim booked in a counter case?

Chinmayananda: The early years
Born Krishna Pal Singh in 1947 in Gonda, Chinmayanand reportedly left home at the age of 20 to become a disciple of Dharmanand, a ‘swami’ who established the Shri Shankar Mumuksh Vidyapeeth in Shahjajanpur, purportedly to counter the influence of convent schools. Dharmanand’s predecessor Sukhdevanand had established the Swami Sukhdevanand Post Graduate College (SSPG) that Chinmayanand runs today.

After completing his spiritual education, Chinmayanand not only became actively involved in his teacher’s pet educational projects and also got involved with various political movements including the JP movement and the Ram Janm Bhoomi movement.

Chinmayanand and the Ram Mandir movement
Throughout the 1980s, Chinmayanand was closely associated with the Vishwa Hindu Parishad led movement to build a grand temple to the Hindu deity Ram. Educational institutions controlled by Chinmayanand and others like him helped promote their ideas about Hindu values, that eventually helped mobilise support for the movement. For his role, he was rewarded with an elevation among the ranks to becoming the national convener of the Ram Janm Bhoomi Mukti Sangharsh Samiti.

He ended up getting close to everyone from Ashok Singhal, to Lal Krishna Advani. In fact, on November 9, 1989, Chinmayanand presided over an important religious ceremony during the foundation stone laying or ‘shilanyas’ for the proposed Ram temple. This ceremony took place just a short distance away from the disputed structure.
In 2009, the Liberhan Commission report named him as one of the key accused behind the conspiracy to demolish the mosque.   

Previous allegation of rape
In 2011, another woman had made similar allegations against Chinmayanand. She said he had raped and sexually exploited her for years at the Haridwar ashram run by him. On November 30, 2011, an FIR was lodged at the Kotwali police station in Shahjahanpur by the survivor’s father. Chinmayanand obtained a stay from the High Court that prevented his arrest. But, in March 2018, the Adityanath government withdrew charges against him.  

Not just this, one of Chinmayanad’s schools, Sri Shankar Mumukshu Vidyapeeth (SSMV) in Shahjahanpur, also allegedly fabricated school records of the rape survivor in the Asaram case in a bid to show that the girl was 18 at the time of the assault, all in an alleged bid to help Asaram dodge charges against POCSO. 

Political power and protection
His proximity to right-wing supremacist political heavyweights and his ability to further their cultural agenda using educational institutes helped launch Chinmayanand’s political career. The communal turmoil, both before and after the Babri Mosque demolition, helped consolidate his vote bank and his place in the higher echelons of political power.

Chinmayanand is a three-time BJP MP winning from Jaunpur and Macchlishahr. Throughout his three stints in Parliament, he has been a vociferous advocate for the Ram Mandir. In fact, in December 2000, Chinmayanad and Adityanath both raised the matter in Parliament. Chinmayanand had been closely associated with Adityanath’s guru Avaidynath during the 1980s. Later Chinmayanand went on to manage the Shahjahanpur branch of Adityanath’s Hindu Yuva Vahini.

This is chilling given that in a state where Adityanath is Chief Minister, the woman who has accused Chinmayanand of sexual exploitation has been slapped with extortion charges. Also, one cannot shake a sense of foreboding given what happened to the Unnao rape survivor and her family.
 

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The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)’s Chinmayanand, accused of rape by a law student, was finally arrested on Friday, five days after the survivor elaborated the incident of sexual assist that she faxed for over a year. In the period she also faced blackmail. She submitted the incident before a court. It’s been close to a month after the allegations first surfaced. Just two day before, the survivor accused the Uttar Pradesh government for their lax attitude towards the accused and had asked, “Will they believe me if I kill myself?”

Chinmayanand has been charged with “misusing authority for sexual intercourse” or “sexual intercourse not amounting to the offence of rape”, according to his lawyer. The police are yet to confirm this charge, which carries a punishment of up to five years in jail and a fine.

Before his arrest from his Mumuksha Ashram, the politician who is 73 now, was taken in a senior police officer’s car to a hospital in Shahjahanpur in Uttar Pradesh around 5.30 am. He had been hospitalised yesterday after he complained of “uneasiness and weakness”. Some reports emerging from the ground, however, have asserted that this was in an attempt to prevent his arrest.

The survivor had been trying to file a rape complaint for almost a month but the UP police refused to do so. Once arrested, apparently, he has been not charged with rape still. The only charges the police did file was that of kidnapping and intimidation, which the woman’s family had alleged after she went missing.

He was finally arrested a day after UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, at a press conference on his government’s half-way mark, claimed that women’s safety was a priority for him and crime had dropped since he came to power at the head of a BJP government.

The 23-year-old woman, a student at a law college that Chinmayanand runs, on Monday went to a court protected by over 50 police personnel and recorded her statement in the court of the chief judicial magistrate.
 
But a Supreme Court-appointed Special Investigation Team (SIT) refused to file rape charges or arrest him. “There will be no arrest unless there is solid evidence. We will not be pressured by media trial,” a senior officer said at a press conference on Wednesday.

The survivor has alleged that Chinmayanand sexually exploited her for a year after helping her with admission into his college. He allegedly filmed her taking a bath and blackmailed her with the video and raped her. The woman says she was raped repeatedly for a year by the politician. She was allegedly brought to his room at gunpoint and was even forced to give Chinmayanand massages.

The survivor reportedly has said that she decided to gather evidence against him and filmed him with a camera in her spectacles. The case surfaced when she went missing on August 24 after putting up a Facebook post without naming Chinmayanand. When the UP police found her after a week, the Supreme Court heard her allegations and ordered an SIT to inquire into them. The team questioned the woman, visited her hostel room and later questioned Chinmayanand for seven hours last week.

Chinmayanand was a union minister for home in former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s government.
 

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