The missing Swami

While he has managed to dodge them twice,Swami Asimanand seems an unlikely target for a hunt by the ATS teams of two states.

While he has managed to dodge them twice,Swami Asimanand seems an unlikely target for a hunt by the ATS teams of two states. In his late fifties,Asimanand has both the Rajasthan ATS and the Maharashtra ATS looking for him in connection with the Ajmer and Malegaon blasts.

A post-graduate in Botany,Asimanand traces his origins to Hooghly,West Bengal,where he was known as Jatin Chatterjee. Some say he took to the Ramkrishna Mission after being disillusioned with the Left. He later joined the saffron ranks and is now a known Sangh Parivar affiliate.

Asimanand came to South Gujarats tribal the Dangs district in the late 90s the Shabarikumbh Mela is said to be his brainchild. He reportedly claimed credit for stemming the Christian missionaries activities in the Dangs.

In an earlier interview to The Indian Express,Asimanand said: The Hindu samaj faces two big challenges Islamic jehad and Christian conversions. We need to confront both these threats on a global scale. Asked about the Shabarikumbh,he said,The four traditional Kumbh melas began when Hinduism was under threat. We thought it was time to start a fifth one to meet the threat of conversions in this region.

Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur,one of the accused in the Malegaon blast,is reported to have been among the many Sangh Parivar members who congregated at the 2006 Shabarikumbh Mela. Asimanands driver Sunil Dhawdes phone number was found in Pragyas cellphone. Dhawde was questioned by ATS officials,but later released. In Surat,Pragyas father Chandrapal Singh also confirmed that the Sadhvi knew Asimanand. In November 2008,soon after Pragyas arrest,Asimanand did the disappearing act. But villagers in the area claim that he later came back,and was in Shabaridham,where his Trust runs the Shabari Temple,till the recent arrests in the Ajmer blast case.

Speaking on condition of anonymity,a villager said Asimanand would meet only a select group of people after his name cropped up in the Malegaon blast. At the Dandakarnya Vanvasi Kumar Chhatralya in Waghai,where Asimanand is believed to have begun his association with the Dangs,pracharaks are tight-lipped.

I met Swamiji in the ashram a few months ago during my routine visit to the Shabrimata temple. We discussed the development projects in the Dangs. He guided me on how to carry out the works, said the Dangs district MLA Vijay Patel BJP.

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In Navapur,the border town in Maharashtra,which is just seven kilometres from the Gujarat border,Ganesh Wadnere,a Shiv Sena councillor,confirmed that the Swami was in Navapur during Dussehra.