Why Order for Chinmayanand’s Bail is a ‘Disaster of Jurisprudence’

From pre-judging the case to using regressive stereotypes, here all that’s wrong with the Allahabad HC’s order .

“As pointed out earlier, that both the parties crossed their limits and at this stage it is very difficult to adjudicate as to who exploited whom?? In fact, both of them used each other (sic).”   

These are just two of the problematic lines from the Allahabad High Court’s order dated 3 February, granting bail to former Bharatiya Janata Party minister and self-styled godman Chinmayanand.

Unfortunately, there is a lot more to this order by Justice Rahul Chaturvedi, which not only runs the risk of pre-judging the case (despite some caveats by him) but also appears to endorse a number of regressive views concerning sexual abuse and how women who have been subjected to such abuse should conduct themselves.