Bengaluru, Apr 2 (UNI) The Karnataka High Court on Wednesday quashed a rape case filed in 2015 against Raghaveshwara Bharati Swami, the head of the Shree Ramachandrapura Math, citing procedural irregularities and an unexplained delay in filing the complaint.
Justice M Nagaprasanna observed that the nine-year delay in reporting the alleged incidents was not justified. The case involved allegations that the seer raped a female disciple in 2006 when she was a minor and again in 2012 after she had become an adult.
The court ruled that the chargesheet in the case had been improperly filed by the Crime Investigation Department (CID) before it was legally declared a police station by a 2024 government notification. It also noted that a magistrate had failed to apply judicial discretion while taking cognisance of the case in 2018.