Varanasi: On the call of UP Congress Committee President Ajay Rai, Congress workers staged a protest at the district headquarters on Wednesday against the lodging of an FIR under the Pocso Act against Swami Avimukteshwaranand, and demanded Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s intervention to stop the harassment of the seer. They sought an impartial probe into the incident by a retired high court judge. A few hours later, Avimukteshwaranand convened a press conference, claiming that the “complainant, Ashutosh Brahmachari, who’s a criminal past, is sharing the updates on the probe with mediapersons on a WhatsApp group”. “It appears that he’s a part of the probe team,” he said. Without naming chief minister Yogi Adityanath, the seer said that anyone who wears saffron clothes should behave like a saint. A group of Congress functionaries and workers, led by city chief Raghvendra Chaubey, reached the district headquarters amid the sound of conch shells and staged a demonstration. The demonstrators warned that if any repressive action was taken against the seer, their party would strongly oppose it and launch a widespread movement through democratic means. In their memorandum addressed to the PM, the Congress workers recalled the Magh Mela Prayagraj incident during Avimukteshwaranand’s procession and termed the lodging of the FIR as condemnable and against the dignity of the entire saint community and Sanatan tradition. They demanded that the PM must intervene and ensure the entire matter was investigated in a time-bound and transparent manner under the supervision of a retired HC judge to bring out the truth.
