- Shivamurthy Murugha Sharanaru was facing allegations of sexually abusing minor girls
- Initial complaints were filed after two students reported abuse to a Mysuru-based non-profit
- He was arrested in September 2022, spent 14 months in jail, then released on bail in 2023
The seer of Chitradurga's Sri Murugha Mutt, Shivamurthy Murugha Sharanaru, accused of raping minor girls staying in the mutt, has been acquitted in one of the two cases filed against him.
A sessions court in Karnataka passed its orders today, acquitting him in the cases filed under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act or POCSO.
A big Lingayat seer, Shivamurthy Murugha Sharanaru comes from a very powerful mutt in Karnataka.
In August 2022, two girl students studying at a school run by the mutt had made allegations before a Mysuru-based non-profit, Odanadi Seva Samsthe, accusing the seer of sexually abusing them. The NGO brought it to the notice of the district children's welfare committee.
A case was filed at the Nazarbad Police Station in Mysuru on August 26, 2022, and subsequently transferred to Chitradurga the next day.
The second case under POCSO was registered after the mother of two minor girls filed a complaint alleging that her daughters and two other girls were sexually assaulted by the seer while they were residing in the hostel between 2019 and 2022.
He was arrested on September 1. After being in jail for 14 months, he was released on bail in November 2023, following bail from the High Court. He was however arrested again on November 20, in connection with a second case.
The Supreme Court, though, put a freeze on the bail order and ordered him to surrender.
The medical examination of the girls, though, had contradicted their allegations that they had been repeatedly sexually abused for three years.
