The Delhi High Court on Tuesday expressed shock at the state of a north Delhi-based ashram - Adhyatmik Vidhyalaya - where women were allegedly kept confined in “animal-like conditions”. The founder of the ashram, a self-styled spiritual guru - Virender Dev Dixit, accused in two rape cases, has been absconding for the past three years.
“We find it difficult to accept that the inmates of the institution are in their full senses of their own free will and they are not under the coercion and undue influence,” a Bench of Acting Chief Justice Vipin Sanghi and Justice Navin Chawla said.
The court’s observation came on a petition by the parents of a girl staying in the ashram. The parents, represented by senior advocate Menaka Guruswamy and advocate Sravan Kumar, said they were denied interaction with their daughter by the management of the ashram.
The senior citizens said they had come all the way from Hyderabad to Delhi to meet their daughter on March 27, 2022, but were denied access.
Senior advocate Guruswamy relied on a 2017 report, submitted by a court-appointed team after inspecting the ashram, which stated that “over 100 girls were housed in animal like conditions with no privacy”.
On Tuesday, the High Court remarked, “What kind of an ashram is this?… Sheer nonsense.. something like this is happening in broad daylight in a city like Delhi. We are going to direct the government to take over the institution”.
The High Court ordered the Delhi police to ensure that the inmates inside the ashram are “not taken out and removed” before the case is heard again on April 21.
Virender Dev Dixit, the founder of the Ashram, was declared an absconder by the Central Bureau of Investigation in 2019 after being accused in two rape cases. The investigating agency has offered a reward of Rs 5 lakh for information leading to his arrest.
The High Court directed that the present case be listed on April 21 along with another petition concerning the affairs of the ashram. In the meantime, the court directed that the parents be allowed to meet their daughter.
Earlier in December 2017, an NGO, Foundation for Social Empowerment, had in a separate petition alleged that several minors and women were being illegally confined at the ashram and not allowed to meet their parents. It had alleged that a parent had lodged a rape complaint with the police, but no FIR had been registered.
The High Court had then asked a team appointed by it to conduct an inspection of the ashram. The team comprising advocates Ajay Verma and Nandita Rao, and Delhi Commission for Women chairperson, Swati Maliwal, had raised grave apprehension about the health of the inmates inside the ashram, noting that several inmates appeared to be under the influence of drugs or narcotic substances.
