Washington, March 08: An octogenarian Hindu spiritual guru has been convicted of molesting two young girls who grew up at his Texas ashram in the mid-1990s.
Prakashanand Saraswati, founder of the Barsana Dham ashram in Austin, has been found guilty of all 20 counts by a jury and was due to be sentenced later on Monday.
Voicing disappointment over the verdict, ashram spokesman Aman Agrawal spoke of plans to go in appeal to establish the innocence of the 82-year-old guru, addressed by his followers as “Shri Swamiji”.
The charges followed allegations by two women, Shyama Rose and Vesla Tonnessen Kazimer, now 30 and 27 years old, whose families lived in the 200-acre ashram.
They alleged that the guru kissed and fondled them on numerous occasions over the course of several years, beginning when they were as young as 12, the Austin American-Statesman reported.
While the prosecution accused the Swamiji of using religious as a weapon, defence attorneys asserted that the two women were “rejects” who made up the incidents because they were shunned by him and ostracised by his organisation.
Following the allegations, the Swamiji was arrested in April 2008 as he arrived at Washington’s Dulles Airport from a European tour. He was later released on a $1 million bail. Last Friday, he sat through the trial in a wheel chair.
The court pronouncement against the Swamiji is the latest in a series of cases of indictment or adverse verdict against members of the Indian American community, an ethnic group that is usually feted for its high levels of achievement and excellence in different walks of life. It comes within days of the stunning charges against Rajat Gupta in what has been projected as the US’s biggest insider trading scam. Gupta, an alumnus of IIT Delhi and Harvard Business School, had been looked upon as an Indian American corporate icon over the past couple of decades. Several other Indian Americans have been arrested in the same case over the past year and a half.
One of the executives wanted by the authorities has been declared a fugitive. Identified as Deep Shah, formerly an analyst with Moody’s, has been traced to Mumbai, the US authorities said in an affidavit filed last week. In another case over the past week, Indian American doctor Randeep Mann has been sentenced to life imprisonment for allegedly planting a car bomb in 2009 that critically injured Trent Pierce, chairman of the Arkansas Medical Board. Mann’s wife, Sue, was sentenced to a year in prison for obstructing justice.
Prosecutors said Mann was out to exact revenge after Pierce pulled Mann’s licence to prescribe narcotics because he overdosed patients on drugs. Pierce lost some of his sight and hearing in the bombing, and was left badly scarred. The Manns, however, maintain their innocence and plan to appeal. In yet another guilty verdict last week, New York-based Indian American jewelers Atul Shah and Mahaveer Kankariya were convicted of staging a fake robbery in a futile bid to walk away with $7 million in insurance payout.
Meanwhile, the spotlight is on the ill-gotten diamonds of Sujata ‘Sue’ Sachdeva, the former executive of the Milwaukee-based Koss Corp., who attracted attention last year for embezzling $34 million in order to pay for her “irrational” buying sprees. While Sachdeva is serving an 11-year prison term, the 300-odd lots of diamonds, watches and fine jewellery that she bought with her employer’s money will all be auctioned by the US Marshals Service on March 19.
—Agencies