Swami Chinmayanand, the BJP leader booked by the Shahjahanpur police for criminal intimidation and abduction of an LLM student from UP, has had his fair share of controversies.
The 72-year-old came in the news recently, ever since the post-graduate law student went missing after a video clip surfaced in which she accused "a leader of the sant community" of harassing her. The UP police on Wednesday, 28 August, claimed that the student had been spotted at a Delhi hotel, but she had already left when a police team reached there.
In November 2011, Chinmayanand was booked for allegedly raping a woman who had spent several years at his ashram.
In the FIR lodged by that women’s father, Chinmayanand, who has been an MP three times, was accused of confining her at an ashram in Haridwar.
The BJP leader moved the Allahabad High Court, which stayed his arrest. The case has been pending since then. The woman had recorded her statement before the judicial magistrate under Section 164 of the CrPC, but no action was taken by the police.
Last year, the Yogi Adityanath government in Uttar Pradesh even sought to withdraw the case, but a local court had denied permission for the same.
Who is Swami Chinmayanand?
Chinmayanand is a former Union minister. He was Minister of State for Internal Affairs in the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government. In 1999, he was elected to the 13th Lok Sabha from Jaunpur in Uttar Pradesh, as a Bharatiya Janata Party candidate. He was also a member of 10th Lok Sabha from Badaun in 1991, and from Machhlishahr in 1998.
He is the director of several higher education institutes in Shahjahanpur such as Swami Shukdevanand Post Graduate College, SSMB Inter College and Swami Shukdevanand Law College. He also runs the Mumukshu Ashram.
Along with Shahjahanpur, the 72-year-old has ashrams in Haridwar and Rishikesh, with his empire said to be worth crores of rupees, according to an NDTV report.
Chinmayanand is said to still command a considerable degree of political influence, with Yogi Adityanath having visited his ashram in Shahjahanpur in 2018.
From a young age, he is said to have been inspired by the teaching of Buddha and Mahavira and decided to lead the life of an ascetic.
The girl who has gone missing after posting a video about the Chinmayanand’s threats and harassment has still not been found.
While Chinmayanand claims ‘conspiracy’ against him, the police has filed a case of criminal intimidation and abduction against him. However, it took the police three days to file an FIR.
(At The Quint, we question everything. Play an active role in shaping our journalism by becoming a member today.)