Jodhpur:
Controversial godman Asaram Bapu, arrested for alleged sexual assault, was today taken to jail like any normal prisoner instead of the earlier practice of transporting him alone in a police vehicle with two other police vehicles escorting him.
The 72-year-old godman will henceforth be taken to court in the same manner as today, wherein he was transported in the jail's bus with other prisoners and made to wait in the court's cell till he was called in court, ADCP (East) Kesar Singh said.
"He will be produced in the court on call and will be re-lodged in the same barrack after the hearing until all the prisoners are taken back to the jail in the evening," Singh said.
He said the decision was taken do away with the compulsion to rope in a huge force and vehicles to take him to jail on every hearing and back, which used up resources reserved for other arrangements or routine policing.
"It was important for us in the wake of the High Court's direction of hearing the case on day-to-day basis and now his treatment at the Rajasthan Ayurveda University," Singh said.
Till now, Asaram was being taken to the court alone in police's 'vajra vahan' with two police vehicles escorting him.
Besides this, adequate police deployment had to be put in place from the security point of view, which according to the police was a VIP treatment, he said.
Now, police have decided to do away with all these arrangements by treating Asaram at par with other prisoners (undertrials), who are routinely taken to the court, he said.
"After this, we will be able to focus on other issues like law and order and investigation and would be freeing ourselves of the compulsion and concern of taking Asaram to court," a senior official said.