SC: Ramdev and his assistant attempted to avoid making a personal appearance in the Patanjali case

The Supreme Court said on Wednesday that it is “very unacceptable” that yoga master Ramdev and his close aide Balkrishna of Patanjali Ayurved tried to “wriggle out” of their attendance in the highest court.

A bench of Justices Hima Kohli and Ahsanuddin Amanullah stated that they were ordered to appear in person after receiving notices to show cause for the Ayurveda firm’s “misleading” advertisements and for disobeying a court-issued undertaking. However, they made an effort to evade this by filing applications for an exemption because they were going overseas.

“It is now being stated in the affidavits filed by the proposed contemnors that admittedly the tickets were issued on a day after the affidavit was sworn and explains that at the time of filing of the affidavits, the photocopies of the tickets were enclosed with the applications, that is on March 31,” the court stated.

“The fact remains that on the date when the affidavits were sworn, there was no such ticket in existence and therefore, the assumption is that the respondents were trying to wriggle out of their appearance before this court which is most unacceptable,” it continued.