Three persons, including Anand Giri, have been charged with abetment and criminal conspiracy in the suspected suicide of Mahant Narendra Giri, the leader of the top religious group Akhil Bharatiya Akhada Parishad, who was discovered hanging in his ashram in Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh, in September. Adya Prasad Tiwari and Sandeep Tiwari were also listed in the chargesheet, in addition to Anand, who was Narendra Giri’s protégé. All three were identified in Narendra Giri’s suicide note, and he accused them of psychologically torturing him, prompting the police to launch an abetting suicide FIR.
All three suspects have already been captured and are in custody, having been apprehended within 24 hours after Narendra Giri’s death. On the suggestion of the Uttar Pradesh government, the CBI took up the case 48 hours later. The agency has recovered tapes of the accused’s chats, which have been sent to be forensically examined. It has also asked the court to capture speech samples from Anand Giri and the other defendants, which will be compared to the tapes obtained. The accused had refused to allow his or her voice to be recorded.
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Narendra Giri allegedly made a video on his phone an hour before his claimed suicide in September, in which he stated that he was scared that Anand Giri planned to fabricate a morphed photo of him with a lady, and that he (his disciple) wanted to embarrass him. The video claims, according to police, mirror the 13-page suicide note discovered beside his body. Narendra Giri accused all three men of blackmailing him in the message, according to police, and said that he was despondent.
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Anand Giri, the ashram’s virtual No. 2 man, was banished earlier this year by Narendra Giri on charges of financial theft and irregularities, but has since returned. A video showed him pleading with his mentor for forgiveness, but the reconciliation was short-lived, and charges of blackmail appeared again. Anand Giri claimed a plot “by those who used to extort money from Narendra Giri” immediately after the seer was found dead. Details of Anand Giri’s extravagant lifestyle, which purportedly included skydiving excursions in Australia and racing Lamborghini sportscars at a race track, soon made headlines.
