BENGALURU: The 52nd City Civil and Sessions Court on Wednesday granted anticipatory bail to Ramachandrapura Mutt pontiff Sri Raghaveshwara Swami in the second rape case, registered against him by an artiste.
Judge G D Mahavarker, however, set a condition that the seer should not leave the city till the police submits the final report. The seer also has to execute a bond of `2 lakh and two personal sureties, the judge said. The court had recently granted interim anticipatory bail for 30 days to the seer.
The court also granted anticipatory bail to the other accused in this case. They are Arun Shyam, Anantha, Manjunath Hebbar, Ramesh, Sudhakar, Madhukeshwar Hebbar and Jagadish Sharma who are facing charges of threatening witnesses.
Additional Advocate General A S Ponnanna strongly opposed granting bail to the seer. Referring to the objections filed by the CID to the bail plea, Ponnanna said Raghaveshwara Bharathi did not follow the conditions imposed by the court while granting bail in the first rape case registered a year ago by a ‘Ramakatha’ artiste, besides threatening the witnesses. The seer’s counsel countered that a false complaint has been filed against his client.
Seer Gives Medical Tests a Miss
Ramachandrapura Mutt pontiff Sri Raghaveshwara Swami failed to be present for the medical tests scheduled at Victoria hospital on Wednesday morning. The four-member committee, headed by Dr Dugappa, waited for the seer till 1 pm. Later, the committee wrote to the CID about the seer failing to attend the tests.
The CID notice asked the seer to come for the tests on an empty stomach so that the semen and blood samples could be taken along with the potency test. An investigating officer said the doctors were also supposed to examine the moles on the seer’s body.
The seer also sent his reply to CID Investigating Officer DySP Ashok Kumar on Tuesday regarding the notice issued to him.
“I have received the notice to appear for the remaining medical tests at 9 am on Wednesday. I already cooperated in the various medical tests, including blood samples collected for DNA test, in compliance of the notice issued on October 18, 2014. This was also in compliance of the observations made by the High Court,” the seer wrote.