The 60-year-old tantrik is being investigated for sexually assaulting his female devotees, most of whom came from poor backgrounds.
Tohana (Haryana): Baba Amarpuri’s ‘temple’, where he is alleged to have drugged, raped, filmed and blackmailed nearly 60 female devotees, lies at the intersection of two divergent paths – literally and figuratively.
In the interior town of Tohana in Fatehabad district of Haryana, one has to travel on metalled roads as well as dirt paths, coming across homes with parked sedans as well as men riding bullock carts, to reach the triangular building in Ward No.19, Bhatia Nagar, where the Baba lived and ran a tantric/occult ‘temple’.
Till a few days ago, the Baba would walk about laden with jewellery, reportedly carrying a licenced revolver with a butt plated with solid gold — a far cry from 20 years ago, when he sold jalebis.
But his ‘temple’ isn’t grand or opulent. In fact, one can’t even begin to compare it to the grandeur of other (in)famous Babas like Asaram or Gurmeet Ram Rahim. By any yardstick, the ‘temple’ is ordinary, situated at one corner of an ordinary, middle-class neighbourhood.
Above the doorway stands a giant hoarding featuring a sit-down image of the Baba, with a jaapmaala (prayer beads) in his right hand, and the index finger pointing at the sky. The hoarding declares that this is “Shri Baba Balak Nath Mandir, Tohana”, run by “Mahant Amar Puri Naga”.
A peek inside
Although the ‘temple’ is now locked up, there is a tiny hole in the gate through which one can take a look inside.
There are framed photographs of the 60-year-old Baba — in Godman-like attire — up on the wall. There are other photographs too, some featuring women, as well as tantric images. Off to one side is a stairwell leading upstairs. There’s no obvious stairway to the basement, where the alleged crimes took place, from the ‘temple’ itself.
There is another entrance to the building, which doubled up as the Baba’s home. That’s also locked, but has a CCTV camera on top of the door.
A neighbour who shares a wall with the Baba’s home described him as a complete recluse.
“He would never interact with anyone except for an occasional namaste,” said the neighbour, who wished to remain anonymous. For the last 15-odd years, the Baba would mostly stay inside his compound. There would be a commotion in the neighbourhood only on Thursdays, when devotees would come to visit him.
Who were these devotees?
Neighbours vehemently shake their heads in denial when asked if they were ever devotees of the Baba. Asked if the devotees were all local to the Tohana area, one neighbour said: “No, he had devotees who would flock to him all the way from Delhi as well.” Another said the Baba charged Rs 11,000 every time a devotee visited him.
However, the lead police officer investigating the case, Bimla Devi, said most of the victims were young women from poorer backgrounds.
“Some women would have alcoholic husbands, others would have sons with a drug abuse problem. Some would have a family member down with a serious illness. The Baba claimed to have the ability to solve all problems causing distress in the lives of these women,” Devi told ThePrint.
But did just women come to see him or couples too? “If a woman went with her husband, the Baba would ask him to wait outside, or come back after three hours. This would allow him enough time to sexually abuse the woman,” Devi said.
Did all these women hail from rural backgrounds? “Most of them, yes. Only one so far has been found to be a resident of Delhi and slightly more educated than the rest of the victims. It is mostly rural women who would opt to go to the Baba instead of seeking help from a professional doctor. He was an all-powerful tantrik in their eyes, someone who could solve whatever bothered them,” Devi said.
And when these women went to him for help and solace, he would drug them, rape them, and make videos of the act to blackmail them into further sexual harassment, said the investigators. This way, the women had to keep returning to him.
How the lid was blown off it
Pradeep Kumar, station house officer at the Tohana City police station, claims to be the cop who busted the Baba’s sex racket.
“One of my sources showed me videos of the Baba raping women. I was stunned and immediately took action,” Kumar said.
“Because sexual assault cases are led by women’s cells, we handed over the case to them. This led to further discoveries, and eventually, to the Baba getting arrested the same day.”
Asked what he felt about the sort of faith the Baba had commanded, SHO Kumar said: “This is a matter of people’s beliefs. Nothing can be done about it. For us, this is only a matter of rape and harassment. We’re dealing with it as such.”
How have his followers reacted?
Baba Amarpuri continues to deny all the allegations, and claims he’s being framed. However, close to 120 videos of the Baba’s sexual acts have now surfaced, and the police have requested all the victims to reach out to the investigators and file official complaints.
So far, only three victims have come forward. At the same time, plenty of devotees continue to reach out to the Baba for his help and guidance; his following doesn’t seem to have declined much even after these allegations surfaced.
As a neighbour muses when asked about the Baba: “If Ram Rahim could build an entire empire by exploiting people, what is this man in comparison?”