Ashram funds under scanner

Did the controversial godman Swami Nithyananda invite his re-arrest by filing a Rs 10 crore claim against Chief Minister D.V. Sadananda Gowda, senior police and district officers and a private media channel for damaging the property in his Bidadi ashram just before he was enlarged on bail or was his arrest ‘necessary’ in the interest of his own life?

Senior police and district officers, not willing to go on record, said if Nithyananda was released on Thursday, his life would have been in danger after he sued the CM for damages. “The pro-Kannada activists would not have spared him because they consider him a rank outsider, who is reportedly vitiating the atmosphere in the State with his alleged sex scandals and other illegal activities,” said an officer. According to unconfirmed reports, the economic intelligence agencies are also reportedly examining the foreign fund flow to the Bidadi ashram.

The police, while pleading for his re-arrest minutes after Nithyananda was released on bail, presented a strong case before the executive magistrate and put together the controversial CD, reportedly of the godman with one his former devotees in a compromising position – the case, in which he has been chargesheeted by the CID, newspaper clippings of his alleged sex scandals and other controversies for which the godman has been in the news for some time now.

They argued that if released, his life would be in danger. The entire police machinery at Ramanagaram was reportedly pressed into building the case around the godman’s arrest. Interestingly, Nithyananda was to be produced before the JMF Court at 11am, but because of some function in the court premises, it was delayed till 3pm. In the meantime, TV channels started flashing the news of the petition he filed against the CM and the fleet of Mercedes Benz cars waiting outside the court hall to whisk him away to Tamil Nadu. “It sent a wrong signal throughout the State and would have created public unrest in the region,” said the officer.

Post new comment

<form action="/comment/reply/161197" accept-charset="UTF-8" method="post" id="comment-form"> <div><div class="form-item" id="edit-name-wrapper"> <label for="edit-name">Your name: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <input type="text" maxlength="60" name="name" id="edit-name" size="30" value="Reader" class="form-text required" /> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-mail-wrapper"> <label for="edit-mail">E-Mail Address: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <input type="text" maxlength="64" name="mail" id="edit-mail" size="30" value="" class="form-text required" /> <div class="description">The content of this field is kept private and will not be shown publicly.</div> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-comment-wrapper"> <label for="edit-comment">Comment: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <textarea cols="60" rows="15" name="comment" id="edit-comment" class="form-textarea resizable required"></textarea> </div> <fieldset class=" collapsible collapsed"><legend>Input format</legend><div class="form-item" id="edit-format-1-wrapper"> <label class="option" for="edit-format-1"><input type="radio" id="edit-format-1" name="format" value="1" class="form-radio" /> Filtered HTML</label> <div class="description"><ul class="tips"><li>Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.</li><li>Allowed HTML tags: &lt;a&gt; &lt;em&gt; &lt;strong&gt; &lt;cite&gt; &lt;code&gt; &lt;ul&gt; &lt;ol&gt; &lt;li&gt; &lt;dl&gt; &lt;dt&gt; &lt;dd&gt;</li><li>Lines and paragraphs break automatically.</li></ul></div> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-format-2-wrapper"> <label class="option" for="edit-format-2"><input type="radio" id="edit-format-2" name="format" value="2" checked="checked" class="form-radio" /> Full HTML</label> <div class="description"><ul class="tips"><li>Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.</li><li>Lines and paragraphs break automatically.</li></ul></div> </div> </fieldset> <input type="hidden" name="form_build_id" id="form-3595d35fb5724fd60c5b5790bcf08a69" value="form-3595d35fb5724fd60c5b5790bcf08a69" /> <input type="hidden" name="form_id" id="edit-comment-form" value="comment_form" /> <fieldset class="captcha"><legend>CAPTCHA</legend><div class="description">This question is for testing whether you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions.</div><input type="hidden" name="captcha_sid" id="edit-captcha-sid" value="85638820" /> <input type="hidden" name="captcha_response" id="edit-captcha-response" value="NLPCaptcha" /> <div class="form-item"> <div id="nlpcaptcha_ajax_api_container"><script type="text/javascript"> var NLPOptions = {key:'c4823cf77a2526b0fba265e2af75c1b5'};</script><script type="text/javascript" src="http://call.nlpcaptcha.in/js/captcha.js" ></script></div> </div> </fieldset> <span class="btn-left"><span class="btn-right"><input type="submit" name="op" id="edit-submit" value="Save" class="form-submit" /></span></span> </div></form>

No Articles Found

No Articles Found

No Articles Found

I want to begin with a little story that was told to me by a leading executive at Aptech. He was exercising in a gym with a lot of younger people.

Shekhar Kapur’s Bandit Queen didn’t make the cut. Neither did Shaji Karun’s Piravi, which bagged 31 international awards.