Jail, caning for Indian national who violated 'safe space' by molesting women when teaching yoga class

Shaffiq Alkhatib
The Straits Times
Aug 30, 2024

A former yoga instructor was sentenced to 23 months’ jail and four strokes of the cane on Aug 30 for molesting three women when he was conducting classes with them.

At the time of the offences, Indian national Rajpal Singh, 35, was working at Trust Yoga in Telok Ayer Street, where all three victims were members. He no longer conducts lessons there.

Before handing down the sentence, District Judge Sharmila Sripathy-Shanaz said that Singh had abused the trust placed in him by the three women, whom she referred to as Ms C, Ms V and Ms R.

She also said that the trio had suffered emotional and psychological harm.

The judge said that Ms C has been receiving therapy from a counsellor, adding: “(She) testified that she had regarded yoga classes as ‘a safe space’ and had not expected to have been violated during a yoga class by a teacher who was in a position of authority in the room.”

The judge added that Ms V had testified that she remains “very affected” by her ordeal and described it as a “very traumatic experience”.

“Ms R... shared that it took her several months to process the ‘trauma’ with a therapist,” said the judge, who also noted that all three victims no longer practise yoga.

After a 13-day trial, she convicted Singh on May 16 of five molestation charges involving the three women. She had found that the trio were “unusually convincing” witnesses.

Singh was acquitted of three other molestation charges involving a fourth woman, Ms Y.

Ms C, who was 24 at the time, attended Singh’s class from 4.30pm to 5.30pm on July 11, 2020. A CCTV camera recorded the session, and its footage was admitted as an exhibit during the trial.

Ms C was in a yoga position called a “forward fold” when he molested her. She was in another pose when he outraged her modesty again.

Deputy public prosecutors Selene Yap and Gladys Lim had earlier said in their submissions: “(She) felt violated and did not expect to be molested in class by a teacher. She expected yoga classes to be a safe space and was confused about how to react.”

Ms C later told a friend and her mother what had happened.

Ms V, who was then around 24 years old, attended classes from Sept 30, 2019, to July 29, 2020, and Singh molested her twice within that time.

During the trial, she stated that she saw Singh as a properly trained instructor who should have known how to appropriately adjust students’ poses.

The DPPs said this made it difficult for her to accept or believe that he would have molested her.

The court heard that initially she had a strong desire to ignore the incident, but she spoke to Ms C and finally alerted the police on Aug 29, 2020.

Ms R was 28 years old when Singh molested her during a class in November 2019. She felt disoriented, confused, shocked and angry.

On Aug 5, 2020, she found out by chance on social media that he had also molested Ms C. Ms R communicated with her via Instagram before alerting the police that day.

Singh had denied molesting the women. Among other things, he said that if he had touched Ms V and Ms R, he had done so to adjust their poses.

On Aug 30, defence lawyer Anil Murkoth Changaroth said that his client will be appealing against his conviction and sentence. His bail was set at $50,000.

Singh still has two pending molestation charges and his pre-trial conference involving them will be held on Sept 16.