Relief For Chinmayanand! In A Courtroom Twist, Law Student Who Accused Him Of Sexual Abuse, Turns Hostile: 10 Points

The woman now faces a perjury charge, while Chinmayanand heaves a sigh of relief in the year-old sexual abuse case.

Justice Rahul Chaturvedi issued the bail order on the plea filed by the BJP leader. On November 16, the court had reserved its order after hearing the counsels from both sides.

New Delhi: A year after accusing former Bharatiya Janata Party MP Swami Chinmayanand of sexual exploitation, the 23-year-old law student turned hostile in a courtroom twist and disowned her own statement to police. The woman now faces a perjury charge, while Chinmayanand now heaves a sigh of relief.

• Appearing before an MP-MLA court in Lucknow, the LLM student categorically denied that she had levelled any allegation against Chinmayanand.
• At this, the prosecution immediately moved an application under Section 340 of the CrPC, seeking action against her for perjury.
• Judge P K Rai directed his office to register the application and asked the prosecution to furnish a copy of the application to the victim and the accused.
• The court fixed October 15 for hearing on the application.
• Chinmayanand was arrested in September last year. He was granted bail by Allahabad High Court this year.
• Chinmayanand’s trust runs the Shahjanpur law college where the woman studied.
• The Allahabad High Court in February this year granted bail to Chinmayanand, whose trust runs the Shahjahanpur law college where the woman studied. He was arrested in September last year.

• The case was registered under Section 376-C of the IPC, an offence pertaining to the abuse of one's position by a person in authority to "induce or seduce" a woman under his charge to have "sexual intercourse not amounting to the offence of rape". Chinmayanand also faced charges under Sections 342 (wrongful confinement), 354-D (stalking) and 506 (criminal intimidation) of the IPC.
• According to government lawyer Abhay Tripathi, the victim had lodged an FIR in this regard with the Lodhi Colony police station of New Delhi on September 5, 2019. Her father lodged another complaint in Shahjahanpur and both FIRs were merged. An SIT had recorded her statement. Later, her statement under Section 164 of the CrPC was recorded in Shahjahanpur.
• The Allahabad high court had on February 3, 2020 transferred the trial from Shahjahanpur to the Lucknow's MP-MLA court.
• In both statements, she had supported the FIR version but now during the trial, she changed her statement and denied the facts mentioned in the complaint.

Chinmayanand faced huge criticism after the woman went missing on August 24 last year, a day after posting a social media video alleging that a senior leader of saint community was harassing and threatening to kill her. Her father then filed a police complaint accusing Chinmayanand of sexually harassing her. Chinmayanand has refuted all the charges and accused the girl and her friends of trying to extort money from him