Rape survivor’s saga of pain began in 2001

SURAT:

The ordeal of the woman devotee

,

raped by Narayan Sai

, began in December 2001 when she went to the Jahangirpura Ashram with his parents,

who were followers of Asaram for years.

PN Parmar, the special public prosecutor in the case, told TOI that the woman was standing in the queue to get prasad after the religious discourse when she was spotted by Sai. He then asked his special ‘sevika’ to get in touch with her. The woman was then brainwashed by Sai’s close aides and she was asked to go n a three-day trip with other sevikas to Meghnagar in MP where a new ashram was being built. She went to another ashram in Bihar too with others from there.

After spending five days at that ashram, when she returned to her house in Surat, she was called by Sai. On the phone, Sai asked her to to come and meet him as he had come to Jahangirpura ashram for a day. He also asked her to contact Hanuman alias Kaushal Thakore , who guided her to Sai’s dwelling place in the ashram. This was sometime in the summer of 2002.

After that she was sent to Gambhoi Ashram in Himmatnagar where she stayed till 2004 where he was molested, raped and harassed during her stay there for two years, according to her police complaint filed in October 2013.

In 2004, she wanted to return home but was not allowed and forcefully locked up on Sai’s instruction in the ashram. She was even beaten up by Sai.

The woman then called up her brother and asked him to take her away under the pretext of her mothers illness. She was allowed to go home but asked to return back.

“When she didn’t return back, two Ashram inmates were sent to her house and they demanded that she must go to back to the ashram and give all the accounts. She went to Himmatnagar again with her parents and lived at her relatives home . However, a tempo full of sevikas visited her relatives place and pelted stones on the house to scare them. She fled back to Surat with her parents in 2004,” said Parmar.

In 2004, she got married, closing the painful chapter of her life, and was living a normal life. However , it was in 2013 after Asaram was caught in Jodhpur rape case and denied bail that she and her parents mustered courage to go to Jahangirpura police and file the complaint on October 6, 2013.