Justice T.L.
Viswanatha Iyer, a former Judge of the Kerala High Court, will be the enquiry
officer (EO) in the place of Justice P.R. Raman, to look into allegations of
sexual harassment of women and children in the Sri Aurobindo Ashram in
Puducherry.
By consent,
in an order on August 30, Justice K.K. Sasidharan appointed Mr. Justice Raman,
also a former Judge of the Kerala High Court, to probe the allegations.
Pursuant to the order, Mr. Justice Raman conducted a preliminary enquiry. The
next enquiry is scheduled from October 23 to 26.
The EO
appeared to have received a representation from 165 persons from Odisha, stated
to be ashram devotees, and who had some information regarding the issues under
consideration. The original understanding was that the enquiry would be
confined to complaints from the inmates of the ashram and the local MLA, and as
such, it would take at least three months. The EO was of the view that it would
take a minimum six months to complete the process. He, therefore, expressed his
difficulty to continue as he had to come from Kochi frequently. He requested
that he be relieved from the engagement.
Mr. Justice
Sasidharan ordered that the enquiry would be in relation to the complaints
received by the District Collector.
The present
and former inmates of the ashram were at liberty to approach the EO, if they
were aggrieved. It was open to the EO to take a decision with regard to
participation of third parties, provided they satisfied that they were inmates
of the ashram at a particular point of time. The EO should conclude the enquiry
as early as possible and file a report before the High Court preferably by
December 31. The matter has been posted for January 2, 2014.
Comment: Retired
High Court Judge P.R. Raman, who was the previous Enquiry Officer, had called for the depositions of not only the inmates of Sri Aurobindo
Ashram but of all other disciples and devotees of Sri Aurobindo staying in or
outside Pondicherry. The enquiry was to be conducted in several stages and
different notifications were to be issued to address the different categories
of devotees and disciples of Sri Aurobindo. So how can the enquiry be limited
to only the inmates of Sri Aurobindo Ashram?
The preamble of the Sri Aurobindo Ashram
Trust Deed states that “Sri Aurobindo
Ashram is the home of persons who are the followers and disciples of Sri
Aurobindo having faith in his philosophy and yoga.” That the beneficiaries of
the Trust are the “disciples, devotees and inmates” is mentioned no less than
half a dozen times in the Trust Deed. This
was sufficiently clarified in the last and only meeting of 27th
September, 2013 presided by P.R. Raman when the question of a letter from
Orissa signed by 165 devotees had come up. The scope of the enquiry had been even
written into the minutes of the meeting by the honourable retired High Court
Judge. How can the scope of the enquiry be changed now to exclude the
non-inmates?
The information
provided by the Hindu news reporter seems to be biased and incorrect because it
sends the wrong information to the public and paves the way for a quick and
sham probe, which is what the Ashram Trustees want to get away with. A large
number of devotees and disciples apart from the inmates fully maintained by the
Ashram Trust are actually quite eager to depose in front of the Commission in
order to set things right in Sri Aurobindo Ashram.
Below is a scan of a
true copy of the minutes of P.R. Raman’s first meeting at Ananda Inn on the 27th
of September 2013.
Bireshwar Choudhury
Kindly put the text of the news story in this website, as The Hindu story on an earlier occasion disappeared mysteriously from the paper's site.That would keep the record in tact as to what was reported and how..
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