Chinmayanand terms sexual harassment case against him 'conspiracy '

Shahjahanpur (Uttar Pradesh) [India], Sept 4 (ANI): Former Union minister Swami Chinmayanand on Wednesday termed the sexual harassment case lodged against him as a "conspiracy" and said that he has full faith in the Special Investigation Team formed to probe the matter.
"The matter is being heard by the court. Thus, it is not right to comment on it right now. But I have full faith in the SIT formed to investigate the case," BJP leader Chinmayanand told media persons here.
He claimed that there are some people who are conspiring against him at a time when Shahjahanpur was on the verge of getting its own university.
"Some people want to stop development here. This conspiracy against me comes at a time when Shahjahanpur was on the verge of getting its university," he added.
On September 2, the Supreme Court had directed the Uttar Pradesh government to constitute an SIT to probe the allegations levelled against Chinmayanand by the law student who was found in Rajasthan, six days after she went missing.

A division bench of Justices R Banumathi and AS Bopanna had said the SIT will be led by an IG-rank officer and assisted by a superintendent of police.

The Allahabad High Court will monitor the probe, the apex court had said, adding the SIT will take note of the FIR and the cross FIR filed in the case.

The bench had directed the Uttar Pradesh chief secretary to provide police protection to the woman and her family.
The court had also asked the state government to transfer the law student to a different college so that she can continue her education.
The judges, who have interacted with the woman, had said that she had expressed certain apprehensions regarding the management of the college. The parents of the girl have also raised apprehensions about their safety, they said.
The court clarified that it was not expressing any opinion on the correctness of the grievances and apprehensions and said that it was retaining the suo motu petition with itself only on the limited aspect of ensuring that the studies of the woman are not discontinued or disturbed.
Last week, the bench had taken suo moto cognisance of the issue after a group of lawyers led by advocate Shobha Gupta wrote a letter to Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi to take note of the case as they did not want another "Unnao case-like incident to happen".
The woman was produced before the Supreme Court on August 30 after she was found in Rajasthan. She had gone missing on August 24 after a video of her alleging that a person from 'Sant Samaj' had threatened to kill her and her parents went viral on social media. (ANI)