Asaram Bapu found guilty of rape: Everything you need to know
A Rajasthan court on April 25 has found self-styled godman Asaram – who runs 400 ashrams across India – guilty of raping a minor. The court has sentenced 77-year-old Asaram to life in jail.
Reports suggest that the self-styled godman broke down and collapsed in his chair on hearing the quantum of sentence.
All the accused in the 2013 rape case, involving Asaram, have been found guilty by a special SC/ST court in Jodhpur. A man of great money and muscle power, Asaram is accused of raping a 16-year-old girl from Shahajahanpur in Uttar Pradesh, who was studying at the godman's ashram at Chhindwara in Madhya Pradesh.
Asaram guilty . Salute to the minor girl & her father who stood up with rape charges against a powerful self styled Godman ! Potency test to death of witnesses, it’s been a long journey for #Justice pic.twitter.com/SKQJNzBSnK
— Anjana Om Kashyap (@anjanaomkashyap) April 25, 2018
The five charges that have been been proven against Asaram Bapu are, raping minor girl, wrongful confinement, criminal intimidation, criminal conspiracy and sexual harassment.
The survivor had alleged that Asaram called her to his ashram in Manai area near Jodhpur and raped her along with his aides on the night of August 15, 2013. Locals say the land on which the ashram is built, was donated to Asaram by the girl's father before the incident.
The girl was brought to Asaram’s ashram for treatment after she fainted one day at her school.
The verdict was delivered by special judge Madhusudhan Sharma in a makeshift court at the Jodhpur Central Jail, where the self-styled godman has been lodged since 2013.
Who is Asaram Bapu
Asaram is a religious leader, who was born as Asumal Sirumalani on April 17, 1941, in Berani village in Sindh province, now in Pakistan. His family migrated to Maninagar in Ahmedabad after Partition and set up a business in coal and firewood.
Asaram started his religious discourses from a small hut in 1971 on the banks of the Sabarmati, not far away from Mahatma Gandhi’s ashram. He went on to establish over 400 ashrams in India, the US, Hong Kong, Canada and South Africa. Over the years, his followers grew in numbers quickly. Ironically, four-and-a-half decades ago, he had shot to fame by preaching about controlling sexual desire.
By 2008, Asaram’s empire was worth Rs 5,000 crore, according to a chargesheet filed by police in a separate case against him in Gujarat.
According to Sant Asaram Bapuji ki Jeevan Jhanki, an autobiography published by his ashram, Asaram received formal education until his father's death and studied only until Class 3. In the following years, he had lived at a series of ashrams and ran away from home to an ashram in Bharuch at the age of 15.
The book also talks about Lilashah, a spiritual guru, who accepted him as her disciple and named him Asaram Bapu on October 7, 1964. As his followers grew, he attracted politicians to his crowded satsangs or religious discourses. The Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party governments gave Asaram land to expand his ashrams.
His wife Lakshmi Devi, daughter and son Narayan Sai, who is in jail in a separate rape case, helped him manage the ashrams and other establishments.
The case against Asaram
The police chargesheet in the case says the cook and warden of the Chhindwara ashram claimed she was being possessed by evil spirits and needed to be exorcised by Asaram. When the parents took her to the ashram at Manai, near Jodhpur, they were told that she needed to be left alone.
The parents later alleged that on August 15, 2013, Asaram sexually assaulted her. In her complaint on August 20 at a Delhi police station, she said that she was asked to perform oral sex and was touched inappropriately. The case was then shifted to Jodhpur and an FIR was lodged.
Asaram was arrested in Indore and brought to Jodhpur on September 1, 2013. He is under judicial custody since September 2, 2013. Final arguments in the case had been completed by the special court for SC/ST cases on April 7 and the court had kept the order reserved to be pronounced on April 25.
The charges against Asaram and four other co-accused Shiva, Shilpi, Sharad and Prakash had been filed by the police on November 6, 2013. The charges under which Asaram and his aides have been booked include rape, trafficking, and under a stringent law on sexual crimes against children that could entail a life term if charges are proved. Asaram’s counsel argued that it wasn’t possible for the self-styled guru to rape the minor as he was impotent.
He was produced before a Jodhpur court and potency test was conducted on him. He was sent to judicial custody on September 2, 2013. He has been languishing in jail since then as 12 of his bail pleas have been rejected one after the other.
In November 2013, the Jodhpur police filed a chargesheet against Asaram and four co-accused in the case. In the chargesheet, it was alleged also that Asaram had video-recorded his sexual acts with several women to blackmail them into granting him further sexual favours.
Witnesses killed
The victim’s family came under pressure over the last five years, when witness after witness who were ready to give testimony against Asaram, were attacked. Altogether, nine witnesses in the two cases against Asaram were attacked, three of them died.
Asaram’s personal aide, Amrut Prajapati, who was a key witness in the case was shot in May 2014. Another associate, Akhil Gupta, who worked as a cook at the ashram, was killed the following year in Muzaffarnagar. In February 2015, Rahul Sachan, a witness in the rape case, was stabbed at the Jodhpur court premises.
The past of violence continued. In May 2015, two unidentified assailants shot at Mahender Chawla, a key witness in the sexual abuse case against Asaram and his son Narayan Sai. Later in November 2017, a key witness, Rahul Sachan, went missing from Kaiserbagh bus stand in Lucknow. A CBI inquiry was ordered to probe his missing.
Why the tight security
Asaram’s arrest in 2013 triggered violence in several areas by his followers and attacks on policemen and media personnel. The supporters also stopped several trains and blocked highways in protest against Asaram’s arrest. Anticipating a repeat of the 2013 trouble, security has been tightened across Haryana, Punjab and Chandigrah.
A Union home ministry's advisory has been sent in view of the fact that large-scale violence was seen in Haryana, Punjab and Chandigarh after a special court pronounced its verdict in a rape case against Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim in 2017.
The Centre on Tuesday, April 24, asked Rajasthan, Gujarat and Haryana to tighten security and deploy additional forces ahead of the verdict by a Jodhpur court in a rape case against self-styled godman Asaram, an official said.
Skeletons tumbling out
In July 2008, the Motera ashram was rocked by a huge controversy after decomposed bodies of two children, aged 10 and 11, were found near the banks of Sabarmati behind the ashram's gurukul (school). Massive protests followed and parents of the two boys, cousins Dipesh and Abhishek Vaghela, accused the ashram of practicing black magic rituals.
Seven sadhaks were arrested in the case. The government constituted a commission to probe the incident under retired high court judge DK Trivedi. After eight extensions, the Justice DK Trivedi Commission finally submitted the report to the state government in July 2013. The report is yet to be tabled in the Assembly.