The Allahabad High Court on Monday, 23 September, expressed satisfaction over the SIT status report in a sexual assault case filed by a postgraduate student against former union minister and BJP leader Swami Chinmayanand.
The special investigation team (SIT), which is looking at the allegations of rape against Chinmayanand and extortion against the student and her friends, had submitted the status report earlier in the day.
The student and her three friends have been booked for extortion by the SIT.
Sources said the SIT also booked the woman on charges of causing disappearance of evidence. On the student's petition, the court said, "If victim wants any relief in this regard, she may file a fresh petition before an appropriate bench." The court fixed October 22 for further hearing.
No Relief for Victim in Extortion Case
The bench comprising Justices Manoj Mishra and Manju Rani Chauhan also refused to grant relief to the law student who sought a stay of her arrest in an extortion case filed by rape-accused BJP leader Swami Chinmayanand.
"If the victim wants any relief in this regard, she may file a fresh petition before an appropriate bench," the court said.
“This bench was nominated to the case only for monitoring the investigation in this matter and has no jurisdiction to pass order on stay of arrest.”Allahabad HC Bench
Former union minister and BJP leader Chinmayanand was arrested on 20 September and sent to 14 days judicial custody. Chinmayanand was admitted to the hospital after his arrest. Professor Amit Agarwal, Chief Medical Superintendent of SGPGI said that Chinmayanand will be stabilised with medicines and then the discharge will be planned in due course of time.
The law student had sought a stay in her arrest after the Supreme Court-appointed special investigation team (SIT) probing the case also arrested three other men on charges of trying to extort money from Chinmayanand and named an unidentified woman as a suspect in the same case.
The woman had claimed that the police were trying to weaken the case against the ruling party politician.
The Case So Far
The UP police took several days to even frame charges against Swami Chinmayanand. On 20 September Chinmayanand was sent to 14-day judicial custody and was accused under section 376C of the IPC, or sexual intercourse by a person in authority, instead of section 376, which is punishment for rape.
The woman meanwhile, has been charged with an extortion case.
In a press release issued by the Special Investigation Team, the law student’s name featured as the fourth name among the accused as ‘Ms A’, reported The Hindu, but the police is yet to get clarity on whether her name was included in the extortion case FIR or explicitly named her as an accused.
According to reports, the survivor had presented over 40 videos as evidences to the SIT and felt ‘let down’ when a weak charge was filled against Chinmayanand.
“This has played out exactly as I feared... there is no justice.”Survivor told PTI
The survivor is a second-year LLM student.
Chinmayanand has fallen sick in jail according to PTI. He has been shifted to Lucknow’s King George Medical University for better treatment.
(With inputs from PTI)
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