‘Low Attendance’: Girl Who Accused Chinmayanand Barred from Exam

Ex-Union minister accused of harassment. 

(Photo: The Quint) 

The law student, who has accused former Union minister Swami Chinmayanand of rape, was on Tuesday, 26 November, stopped from appearing in her LLM third-semester examination due to low attendance, officials said.

The 23-year-old student, who had on Monday appeared in her first-semester back paper amid tight security, was not allowed by the Mahatma Jyotiba Phule Rohilkhand University in Bareilly to appear for the third-semester exam.

She did not have the required 75 percent attendance, officials said.

The law student, accused of demanding extortion money from Chinmayanand, is presently lodged in Shahjahanpur jail.

She was taken to Bareilly on Tuesday amid tight security for appearing in the exam, jailor Rajesh Kumar Rai said.

The head of the law department of the MJP Rohilkhand University, Amit Singh said the law student had come to give her third-semester exam but she did not have the admit card because of attendance shortage.

Singh said that there were no instructions from the court to allow her to appear in the exam in case she did not have 75 percent attendance.

The woman, who was studying at Chinmayanand's Swami Shukdevanand Law College, was given admission to the Bareilly college on Supreme Court's directions in order to ensure that her education continues.

The post-graduate student has alleged that she was physically exploited by the 72-year-old BJP leader for over a year.

Chinmayanand, sent to judicial custody after his arrest, was booked under section 376C of the IPC, which is usually applied in cases where a person abuses his position to "induce or seduce" a woman under his charge to have "sexual intercourse not amounting to the offence of rape".

This is a lesser charge than section 376, under which a rape convict faces a maximum punishment of life imprisonment. The punishment under section 376C is between five and 10 years in jail.

The woman and three of her friends have been arrested for demanding Rs 5 crore from the BJP leader.