Janjivan Bureau / Shahjahanpur : The 23-year-old student who accused BJP leader Swami Chinmayanand of rape was arrested on Wednesday on charges of extortion and sent to judicial custody, police said.
She was arrested around 9.15 am from her home by the Special Investigation Team (SIT) of Uttar Pradesh Police amid massive deployment of forces, sources said.
SIT chief Naveen Arora said the student was arrested after “enough” digital and forensic evidence was found and statements of people recorded.
“We have sufficient evidence that Rs 5 crore in extortion money was demanded from Chinmayanand. Those arrested said they sent messages to Chinmayanand on directions of the girl in panic as they were not getting money and were upset,” he told reporters here.
Anoop Trivedi, the student’s counsel, said he had moved a bail application, which would be heard later in the day. A local court had on Tuesday admitted an interim bail plea filed by the student and fixed it for hearing on Thursday.
The Shahjahanpur locality where the student lives witnessed heavy deployment of police personnel on Wednesday morning. Roads leading to her residence were blocked from both sides before policemen entered the house to arrest her, sources said.
The woman was taken for medical examination and later produced before the court of Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate Vineet Kumar, who sent her to judicial custody, officials said.
SIT chief Arora said forensic examination of the evidence, including pen drive and mobile phones, revealed that there was no addition, alteration, morphing, modification or editing in the videos.
The mobile location and calls made by the student and others were also verified and a chart was prepared which showed that the four (the law student and the three already arrested) were together and in touch, he said.
On the spectacles used for filming Chinmayanand, Arora said, “They were bought online in March by the woman. The woman said they were in her hostel room, which was opened in the presence of a forensic team, principal, the woman and her father, but they were not found. We are yet to recover them.”
The SIT chief said the mobile messages deleted by Chinmayanand could not be retrieved by the FSL and hence it had been sent to the Central Forensic Science Laboratory in Gandhinagar, Gujarat.
The three others accused in the extortion case–Sanjay Singh, Sachin Sengar and Vikram alias Durgesh–were arrested by the SIT on Friday, the day Chinmayanand was arrested.
The woman and the trio had been booked under Sections 385 (extortion), 506 (criminal intimidation), 201 (disappearance of evidences) and 35 (criminal act done with a criminal knowledge or intention) of the IPC and 67 of the Information Technology Act, police said.
The law student’s father and brother alleged that she was arrested even though she did not commit any crime. Her father claimed that a police official was taking “a very soft stand” on the complaint against Chinmayanand.
The student has accused the BJP leader of raping and physically exploiting her for over a year.
Chinmayanand’s own bail application was rejected on Monday by the Shahjahanpur chief judicial magistrate, who said it should be moved in the sessions court, his counsel Om Singh said.
The BJP leader is currently admitted to Lucknow’s Sanjay Gandhi Post Graduate Institute of Medical Sciences after he complained of chest pain.
