Chinmayanand accuser arrested for ‘extortion’
LUCKNOW: The 23-year-old law student, who accused former Union minister Chinmayanand of rape, was arrested from Uttar Pradesh’s Shahjahanpur on Wednesday in an extortion case that the politician filed against her, leading to her family and activists questioning the police action and alleging that the arrest was meant to weaken the case against the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) veteran.
A local court didn’t give her any immediate relief later in the day and scheduled her bail plea hearing for Thursday.
“The woman was arrested from her residence and taken to a hospital for medical examination. She was sent to judicial custody for 14 days,” said inspector
general of police Naveen Arora, who heads the Special Investigation Team (SIT) probing the case.
Chinmayanand, 72, was arrested last Friday but is currently in one of Lucknow’s top hospitals, where he is being treated for cardiac problems. He was also sent to judicial custody for 14 days.
Arora said the woman was arrested after “enough” digital and forensic evidence was found.
“We have sufficient evidence that ₹5 crore extortion money was demanded from Chinmayanand,” he told reporters.
The student has been booked under sections 385 (putting a person in fear of injury in order to commit extortion) 507 (criminal intimidation) and 201 (causing disappearance of evidence or giving false information) of the Indian Penal Code, added Arora.
Three other people, Sanjay Singh, Sachin Singh, and Vikram, were also arrested on Friday for allegedly trying to extort money from Chinmayanand. Arora said the woman confessed that the female voice in a video, in which the extortion demand is being purportedly made to Chinmayanand, was hers. “She has confessed that she was with the other three accused [Sanjay, Sachin and Vikram] after leaving Shahjahanpur,” he added. The father of the woman said that the SIT personnel arrested the woman in haste on Wednesday morning. “They did not show any papers and took away my daughter in a vehicle. They didn’t even allow her to take her slippers with her,” said the father. He rejected the SIT claim that the woman confessed to her alleged involvement in the case. “My daughter has not confessed to anything. She was arrested to put pressure on her and weaken her case against Chinmayanand,” he said.
Chinmayanand, who runs a college in Shahjahanpur where the woman studied, was booked under Indian Penal Code’s sections 376C (sexual intercourse by a person in authority), 354D (stalking), 342 (wrongful confinement) and 506 (criminal intimidation). The woman expressed dissatisfaction over his arrest under weaker IPC sections and said he should have been booked under section 376, which pertains to rape and provides for a maximum life term. Under section 376C, a convict can be given a minimum punishment of five and maximum of 10 years in jail.
The case hit the headlines last month when the woman went missing on August 24 after posting a video on social media alleging that a “senior leader of the seer community” was harassing and threatening her. She did not name Chinmayanand in the video. But when she went missing, her father blamed Chinmayanand for her disappearance. She was later traced to Rajasthan.
The Supreme Court took cognisance of the alleged rape last month and directed the Uttar Pradesh government to form an SIT to probe the matter under the Allahabad high court’s supervision. The woman has alleged Chinmayanand raped and physically exploited her for over a year. Chinmayanand’s lawyer, Om Singh, filed a counter case of extortion against her, alleging the student and her three friends made an extortion demand of ₹5 crore. His bail plea comes up for hearing next Monday.
The developments came on a day the state BJP sought to distance itself from the leader, who was a minister of state in the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government.
The party’s Uttar Pradesh unit spokesman, Harishchandra Srivastava, insisted that Chinmayanand was no longer a part of the party . “He is not a part of the BJP,” he said, but didn’t elaborate on when he ceased to be a member.
When asked whether the BJP was planning any action against Chinmayanand, Uttar Pradesh BJP president Swatantra Dev Singh said: “He was never a BJP member and hence the question does not arise.” But some of his colleagues were not sure if he had been expelled.