Shankaracharya arrest

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Premananda or Trichy Sai Baba was awarded life imprisonment in 1994 for two terms on the charges of multiple criminal offences including rape and murder. Premananda was punished for raping inmates of his ashram and carrying out medical terminations of some of the consequent pregnancies with the help of a couple of associates. Premananda or Trichy Sai Baba was awarded life imprisonment in 1994 for two terms on the charges of multiple criminal offences including rape and murder. Premananda was punished for raping inmates of his ashram and carrying out medical terminations of some of the consequent pregnancies with the help of a couple of associates. (BCCL) Premananda or Trichy Sai Baba was awarded life imprisonment in 1994 for two terms on the charges of multiple criminal offences including rape and murder. Premananda was punished for raping inmates of his ashram and carrying out medical terminations of some of the consequent pregnancies with the help of a couple of associates.(BCCL) A 42-year-old self-styled Sufi dervish Gulzar Ahmed Bhat was recently arrested by Jammu and Kashmir police for raping and sexually abusing several young girls at his religious centre, Khansahib in Budgam district. Gulzar Bhat, who went by the name Syed Gulzar, allegedly ran a residential institution for girls which offered short duration courses in religious studies. A 42-year-old self-styled Sufi dervish Gulzar Ahmed Bhat was recently arrested by Jammu and Kashmir police for raping and sexually...

The Centre today sought to distance itself from the Shankaracharya arrest, even as the issue rocked both Houses during Zero Hour. There were heated exchanges between the BJP-Shiv Sena on one side and the DMK, AIADMK, Left parties and RJD on the other. Intervening during the discussion in Lok Sabha, Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee said neither the Centre nor the Andhra Government had anything to do with the arrest. He said the PM had written a letter to TN Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa purely on humanitarian grounds and that the matter fell under the purview of the TN court. ‘‘Let Parliament not get into this,’’ he added. In the In the In Upper House, ‘‘Even politicians and journalists get preferential treatment when they are arrested. The fact that even the PM had to intervene…shows that the state government was contemptuous of the saint,’’ she said. AIADMK MPs protested against Swaraj’s remarks and P.G. Narayanan said: ‘‘The seer himself has acknowledged before the magistrate he was being treated well.’’ He also protested BJP president L.K. Advani’s demand for shifting the case out of TN. BJP deputy leader V.K. Malhotra, who raised the issue in the Lower House, said the arrest had hurt people’s sentiments. He demanded that the case be shifted out of TN. He was repeatedly interrupted by Mohammad Salim of the CPI(M), Ram Kripal Yadav and Raghunath Jha of the RJD and Ramdas Athavale of the RPI. Amid the din, Speaker

The Sankaracharyas moved the Supreme Court and got the case transferred to Puducherry in 2005 on grounds that the atmosphere in Tamil Nadu was vitiated and there may not be free and fair trial. In November 2013, the Puducherry Sessions Court acquitted Besides the seers, arraigned as accused 1 and accused 2 respectively in the murder of Sankararaman, 21 other accused were also acquitted by Puducherry Principal District and Sessions Judge C.S. Murugan. A total of 24 persons were made accused in the case, but one of them, Kathiravan, was killed in early 2013. Don’t miss out on ET Prime stories! Get your daily dose of business updates on WhatsApp. • Cyclone Biparjoy: Over 30,000 evacuated • Sensex up 85 pts, Nifty tops 18,750 • Internal war within BJP over K'taka poll debacle • 'I'm a victim of Congress' politics' • Watch: CM Stalin visits Senthil Balaji in hospital • Cyclone Biparjoy: Red alert in 6 Gujarat districts • Indictment is 'election interference': Trump • Fresh violence in Manipur; nine killed • TN minister admitted to hospital amid ED raids • Stocks in focus: Zydus Life, Kotak Bank & more

The Kanchi peeth’s head has been cleared of the deed, but the Varadarajaperumal temple manager’s murder remains a mystery In 2004, a manager at a temple run by the Kanchi peeth started writing letters to patrons, authorities, the media and the pontiff himself that ever since Jayendra Saraswathi took over as its Shankaracharya, this seat of Hindu learning had fallen into disrepute. The manager also made noises about financial misappropriation. Given that Kanchi is one of five seats of Adi Shankara’s Advait School of Hinduism, it had the whiff of a scandal. But no one took much notice of Sankar Raman’s letters—until 3 September that year, when he was found murdered on the premises of the Varadarajaperumal temple that he was in charge of. The murder itself would have been little more than a crime statistic, but for an investigative piece that appeared in Tamil weekly Nakkeeran that suggested a conspiracy and pointed fingers at the revered Shankaracharya himself. The police, who latched onto the case quickly, got into the act backed by Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa and arrested Jayendra Saraswathi, his brother Raghu, the junior Swami Vijayendra Saraswathi, another manager called Sundaresan and several others with police records for allegedly eliminating Sankar Raman for having turned into a nuisance for administrators of the math (seat of a religious order). Last week, a judge in the Union Territory of Puducherry acquitted the Shankaracharya and 23 others of the cri...

Bad times: More charges are being brought against the Kanchi head More than three weeks after the sensational arrest of the Kanchi Shankaracharya Jayendra Saraswati, the case against the sanyasi is fast becoming a legal labyrinth. As the Tamil Nadu Police intensify their hunt for more evidence, new characters appear on the scene to make the ordeal of Hinduism's highest priest hyperdramatic. The state prosecutor, meanwhile, has informed the Madras High Court that the Shankaracharya has "admitted to his involvement" in the murder of A. Shankararaman, the manager of the Sri Varadaraja Swamy temple in Kanchipuram. Opposing the seer's release on bail, prosecution lawyer Kavi Tejpal Singh Tulsi told judge R. Balasubramanian in the high court that the police had a "video recording" of his confession. He argued that under Section 437 (1) (i) of the CrPC, no bail could be granted to the seer. "Witnesses have been influenced and retraction of confessions was engineered at the behest of the Shankaracharya," he argued. Tulsi offered to play the video in court or in the judge's chamber. THE SAGA SO FAR NOVEMBER 12: After his arrest the previous night, the Kanchi head is produced in judicial magistrate court, Kanchipuram, and then sent to Vellore Central Prison. NOVEMBER 17: Jayalalithaa says there is solid proof against the seer. NOVEMBER 20: BJP begins three-day national protest against the arrest. NOVEMBER 25: The Supreme Court of India rejects appeal for CBI probe into the case. NOV...

NEW DELHI: The arrest and alleged maltreatment of Kanchi Sankaracharya Jayendra Saraswathi by Tamil Nadu authorities provoked heated exchanges between Opposition and ruling benches in Lok Sabha on Thursday. However, the Government made it clear that Parliament should not interfere in the matter as the law should take it own course. Ruling UPA members repeatedly clashed with those from the Opposition over remarks made by BJP Deputy Leader V K Malhotra with regard to the attitude of political parties on religion. In the midst of the din, Speaker Somnath Chatterjee kept warning agitating members that he would take action if they did not not maintain decorum in the House and expunged certain remarks of Malhotra which created a furore. Raising the issue of arrest of the Sankaracharya in a murder case, Malhotra said the Tamil Nadu authorities were "maltreating" him and torturing witnesses to make statements against the seer. Contending that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had also written a letter to Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa to take care of the pontiff in view to sentiments of the Hindu community, Malhotra demanded that the case against the Sankaracharya should be transferred out of Tamil Nadu to ensure a fair trial. Responding to Opposition''s charges, Leader of the House Pranab Mukherjee said the Centre had nothing to do with the case which was within the purview of the Tamil Nadu Government and the courts there.

When the Principal Sessions Court in Pondicherry on Wednesday (November 27) acquitted the Kanchi Sankaracharyas, Jayendra Saraswathi and Vijayendra Saraswathi, and all the others charged with the murder of Sankararaman, my mind recalled the arrest of the Sankaracharya in November 2004 and the unprecedented vicious atmosphere created by the Dravidian ideologues and parties, secular media and even liberal intellectuals against the Acharya. They sat upon the Kanchi Mutt, held the Acharya guilty and more and spread all kinds of unmentionable canards about him and the Mutt and hurt beyond words the millions of peaceful spiritual followers of the Mutt, who cried in silence with no one to console them. No debate on the Sankaracharya judgment will be complete without recalling the vicious and hurtful discourse against the Acharya and the Mutt and how the ancient institution and its faithful underwent the all round assault and pain silently. When the entire spectrum of secular, human rights and liberal megaphones had turned against the Mutt and the Acharya and desecrated them, it was only The New Indian Expresswhich stood for what it believed was right– namely that the Mutt and the Acharya were being hounded without basis and the case itself was groundless. The judicial verdict exonerating the Acharyas and all the others charged with the crime implies that the entire case was misdirected. Kanchi Sankaracharya Jayendra Saraswathi leaves a court in Puducherry after being acquitted in...