Los Angeles: The founder of Bikram yoga, which involves exercising in a heated room, has been ordered to pay over $7m in damages to a former lawyer who said he sexually harassed her.
A Los Angeles jury awarded $6.5m in punitive damages to Minakshi Jafa-Bodden one day after Bikram Choudhury was ordered to pay $924,500 in compensatory damages to her for a separate claim.
Jafa-Bodden had said Choudhury sexually harassed her and wrongfully fired her for investigating another woman’s rape allegation.
Jafa-Bodden worked as head of legal and international affairs at Choudhury’s Los Angeles yoga school from spring 2011 until March 2013, when she was abruptly fired from her job for refusing to cover up an investigation into a rape allegation.
Choudhury built an empire around Bikram yoga, a rigorous, ninety minute routine performed in a heated room. The technique is taught at over 650 studios across the world and has drawn a throng of devoted followers.
Jafa-Bodden’s wrongful employment termination lawsuit is separate from sexual assault lawsuits filed by 6 other women, 5 of whom accuse Choudhury of raping them. One of those lawsuits is in the process of being settled, whereas the rest are set for trial later this year.
Choudhury’s attorney, Robert Tafoya, said he never sexually assaulted any of the women suing him and that prosecutors had declined to bring charges in their cases.