A Jodhpur court today awarded life sentence to self-styled godman Asaram after holding him guilty of raping a teenage girl in his ashram five years ago, the second case of a powerful spiritual leader being convicted of a sexual offence in less than a year after Dera Sacha Sauda head Gurmeet Ram Rahim last August.
The special court for SC/ST cases convicted two other accused, Shilpi and Sharad, and acquitted two, Prakash and Shiva.
"The court has awarded life imprisonment to Asaram while the two other convicts have been each sentenced to 20 years in jail," a senior police official said.
Arguments for the quantum of sentencing were earlier held inside the heavily fortified jail premises, where the trial court delivered its verdict in accordance with the directions of the Rajasthan High Court.
Asaram, who started from a hut on the banks of the Sabarmati, created a Rs 10,000 crore empire with 400 ashrams in India and other parts of the world in four decades.
The charge sheet against Asaram and the four other co-accused was filed by the police on November 6, 2013 under various sections of the POSCO (Prevention of Children from Sexual Offences) Act, the Juvenile Justice Act and the Indian Penal Code.
The teenager had said in her complaint that Asaram had called her to his ashram in Manai area near Jodhpur and raped her on the night of August 15, 2013.
The young girl from Shahajanpur in Uttar Pradesh was studying at Asaram's ashram in Chhindwara in Madhya Pradesh.
"We had complete faith in the judiciary and are happy that we got justice," her father told journalists after the verdict.
The family, he said, was living in constant terror and their business was hit.
Ahead of the verdict, security was stepped up in Jodhpur where prohibitory orders were imposed.
Apprehending a threat to law and order, the Centre had asked Rajasthan, Gujarat and Haryana governments to tighten security and deploy additional forces as the three states have a large number of Asaram followers.
The Union Home Ministry had sent an advisory fearing a repeat of the violence in Punjab and Haryana that followed the conviction of Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh in August last year, when several people were killed. He was convicted in a 2002 rape case and sentenced to 20 years in prison.
Final arguments in the Asaram case were completed on April 7 and the court had kept the order reserved for April 25.
Asaram was arrested in Indore and brought to Jodhpur on September 1, 2013. He was under judicial custody since September 2, 2013. Asaram is also facing a rape case in Surat in Gujarat in which the Supreme Court earlier this month gave five weeks time to the prosecution to complete the trial.
Asaram unsuccessfully moved 12 bail applications, of which six were rejected by the trial court, three by the Rajasthan High Court and three by the Supreme Court.
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