'Threatened' to falsify girl's age: School principal on Asaram rape case

Jodhpur: Threats and attacks were not just extended to the witnesses of the Asaram rape case, revealed victim's school principal, who said that he was also threatened mentally and physically and pressured to prove that the girl was 18 years old.

In a historic verdict, the Jodhpur Schedule Caste and Schedule Tribe Court on Wednesday held guilty Asaram Bapu and two others in the rape of a 16-year-old girl at his ashram in 2013.

77-year-old Asaram was sentenced to life imprisonment while the other two accused were awarded a 20-year jail term each by the court.

Speaking to NDTV, the Uttar Pradesh school principal said that he was under constant pressure to fudge the girl's date of birth in school records.

"I was pressured, threatened... have suffered mentally and physically... I received threatening letters. I was to mention the date of birth as in the records, they wanted it to be manipulated," the principal said. 

The verdict was pronounced by Judge Madhusudan Sharma inside the Jodhpur Jail due to security reasons.

Also Read: Asaram Bapu gets life imprisonment in rape of minor schoolgirl

In the case registered in Rajasthan, a 16-year-old girl from Shahajahanpur of Uttar Pradesh had accused Asaram of raping her at his ashram in Manai village near Jodhpur on the night of August 15, 2013. The girl was brought to the ashram by her parents.

During these five long years, a number of key witnesses in the case were attacked or went missing. In 2014, Asaram's personal aide was shot dead, while another associate was killed in 2015 in Muzaffarnagar. In the same year, two more witnesses were attacked by unidentified individuals, while another witness went missing from Lucknow.

While the self-styled godman has filed a number of bail petitions, a total of 12 applications were rejected by the trial court, the Rajasthan High Court, and the Supreme Court.