Allahabad High Court confirms anticipatory bail granted to Swami Chinmayanand in 2011 rape case

The Allahabad High Court on Monday confirmed the interim anticipatory bail granted to former Union Minister, Swami Chinmayanand, who was accused of raping a woman from Shahjahanpur, Uttar Pradesh in 2011. [Swami Chinmiyanand Saraswati Pupil v. State of UP & Anr].Justice Dinesh Kumar Singh confirmed the interim order after the complainant, on affidavit, stated that she was not interested in pursuing the case and that she had no objection to withdrawing the criminal prosecution against Chinmayanand. .The State also submitted that it has decided to withdraw from prosecution and that permission had been granted to the Public Prosecutor to file an application under Section 321 (withdrawal from prosecution) of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC). As such, the Court was told that neither the State nor the complainant was opposed to the grant of anticipatory bail to the Chinmayanand. ."Considering the stand of the complainant and the State, this Court finds it appropriate that the interim order dated 19.12.2022 be confirmed and thus, the accused-applicant is admitted on anticipatory bail," the Court said..The Court directed Chinmayanand to appear before the trial court within a week and submit a personal bond and two sureties each of the like amount if he had not already done so in pursuance of the interim order..Chinmayanand was booked after a woman who had spent 11 years at his ashram accused him of committing rape against her..The woman had alleged that, Chinmayanand established a physical relationship with her by force, after administering intoxicants in her food and thereafter brutally ravishing her..Further, Chinmayanand has also been accused of taking obscene audio-visual videos and pornographic photographs. The complainant had further alleged that, in this process, she was impregnated twice. She had stated that on both occasions, she underwent abortion, once in Bareilly and once in Lucknow. Senior Advocate Anoop Trivedi along with advocates CP Pandey and Abhinav Gaur appeared for Chinmayanand. Additional Advocates General, Manish Goyal and Mahesh Chandra Chaturvedi, assisted by Additional Government Advocate AK Sand, appeared for the State. .[Read Order]