Minor girls' confinement: FIR registered, 'godman' Dixit's possible links being probed

An FIR was registered after 67 minor girls were rescued from a hotel in Rajsthan's Rajsamand district last week, the police said today, even as a member of the state Commission for Protection of Child Rights asserted that the incident is linked to self-styled godman Virendra Dev Dixit' ashram.

The girls, aged between five and 16 years, hailing from Nepal, and many Indian states, including Chhattisgarh, Bihar and Madhya Pradesh, were rescued from the hotel by a joint team of the police and the children welfare committee (CWC) on July 4.

The police have said they are probing if the organisation that had wrongfully confined the girls had links to Dixit.

"We have registered an FIR against unnamed accused. We are investigating whether the organisation that wrongfully confined the girls has links to Virdendra Dev Dixit," SHO Rajnagar police station Dinesh Kumar said.

S P Singh, a member of Rajasthan State Commission for Protection of Child Rights, said there were links between the organisation that illegally confined the minors was linked to the ashram of self-styled godman Dixit.

"The links of organisation that wrongfully confined the girls at a hotel have been found with the ashram of absconding spiritual guru Virendra Dev Dixit," , told PTI.

He said that they have written to the respective states to which the girls belong, in order to verify the identity of the girls so that they can be handed over to their biological parents only.

Singh said that the girls had beensecretlyshifted from Sirohi to Rajsamand district.

"The functioning of organisation which wrongfully confined the girls is sanctioned for Sirohi district. They do not have the right to transport and lodge minors in other districts without prior information of the CWCs of Sirohi and Rajsamand," chairperson of children welfare committee in Rajsamand, Bhawna Paliwal, said.

According to the police, the 67 girls were rescued from Raj Mahal Hotel under Rajnagar police station limits last Wednesday. The girls belonged to Nepal and India's Haryana, Assam, Bengal, Odisha, Delhi, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Karnataka, Punjab, Tamil Nadu and Sikkim states.

The rescued girls have been temporarily kept at a shelter home run by Asra Vikas Sansthan in Rajsamand.

The CWC had lodged a complaint with the Rajnagar police station, following which an FIR was registered against unnamed accused under IPC sections 342 (wrongful confinement), 370 (buying or disposing of any person as a slave), 370 (5) (trafficking of more than one person) and sections 42, 75 of Juvenile Justice Act on July 7.