'Pilot Baba' sent to judicial custody

A court here rejected the bail application of spiritual guru "Pilot Baba" in an over-10-year-old case of cheating on Thursday and sent him to judicial custody.

District Judge Narendra Dutt dismissed the baba's bail application and remanded him to judicial custody in connection with a case of cheating, involving lakhs of rupees, lodged against him and the staff members of an educational centre run by him by a former state minister in 2008.

The bail plea of the baba was rejected by the sessions court after he surrendered before Chief Judicial Magistrate Mukesh Kumar.

In November 2008, Harish Pal, who was a minister at that time in the Uttarakhand government, had lodged a complaint against the baba and other staff of Ikawa International Educational Centre at Talla Gethia, Jolikot, alleging that approximately Rs 3.20 lakh were extracted from him under the pretext of setting up a computer centre, which would earn him a revenue of RS 50,500 per month.

Later, on suspecting that he had been cheated, Pal had demanded his money back, but all he had allegedly got was death threats from the baba and his staff.