Court hands over three accused to police custody for interrogation

Ramanagara: The Ramanagara JMFC court has gave custody of three accused in suicide of Kanchugal Bandemutt to police on Monday. The Ramanagara police arrested three persons in connection with suicide of Basavalinga Swamiji of Kanchugal Bandemutt on Sunday and requested the court for custody.

Through the arrest the police confirmed the death was caused by blackmailing through nude videos of Swamiji .The arrested identified as Mrutyunjaya Swamiji of Kannur Mutt in Ramanagara district, Neelambike alias Chandu , an engineering student and native of Doddaballapur and Kannur mutt advocate Mahadevaiah .

Kannur pontiff Mrutyunjaya Swamiji and deceased Basavalinga Swamiji are cousins and fellow seers . Both have lot of property litigation. The Kannur Pontiff hatched a plan to oust Swamiji due to jealousy and planned a revenge through honey trap.

According to the police, Mrutyunjaya Swamiji was eying on the throne of the cash rich Kanchugal Bade Mutt which had a large following of devotees, owned more than 80 acres of land near Bengaluru, reserved funds and ran a number of education institutions. Mrutyunjaya Swamiji, a cousin of deceased seer, was dependent on Siddaganga Mutt of Tumakuru for funds to manage the show. But, the Siddaganga Mutt had distanced itself from the accused seer. Mrutynjaya Swamiji nursed a deep grudge against the deceased seer for complaining against him to the Siddganga, the police said.

The second accused Neelambike used to visit Siddaganga mutt in Tumakuru , befriended with Bandemutt pontiff Basavalinga Swamiji. She allegedly recorded videos of Swamiji through video chat and gave this to Kannur pontiff. It is also alleged that Neelambambike was angry at him as he recorded her conversation bad mouthing other seers and sent the audio clip to those swamijis.

The third accused advocate Mahadevaiah circulated the objectionable videos to other pontiffs after Swamiji did not yield to blackmail. A police official who was part of investigation team said that the videos might have been recorded during April last. After recording videos the honey trap team started to harass Basavalinga Swamiji and demanded cash. The Swamiji clearly mentioned the name of Kannur Swamiji in his death note and committed suicide on October 24.

According to the official, the Kanchugal Bandemutt and Kannur mutt have no relations separate Lingayat mutts . The Kannur mutt have less property compared to Bandemutt and the Bandemutt pontiff Basavalinga Swamiji's growing influence in recent years has caused jealousy and rivalry to Mrutyunjaya Swamiji. The accused were planning to defame Basavalinga Swamiji to curtail growing prominence of the mutt.

Meanwhile a third video was released on Sunday , after earlier two videos. The Kuduru Police booked the three under IPC Section 306 and 34. It is said that Bandemutt Swamiji has written the name of All India Veerashaiva Mahasabha vice president Sachidananda Murthy who was circulating the videos to defame him. Police are likely to question Sachidananda Murthy in this regard.