Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh
The Punjab and Haryana High Court on Tuesday directed the state government that no FIR registered in violence post dera chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh’s conviction shall be quashed without the permission of the court. It also asked the government to file monthly status reports on the investigation. The court said that all FIRs registered shall be investigated by a Special Investigation Team headed by not less than an ADGP rank officer.
The High Court will continue to look into the government’s collusion with the dera. The government told the court that allowing crowd into Panchkula was part of the government’s strategy to bring dera chief out of his headquarters to the CBI court. The court, however, refused to buy state government’s argument, and asked how can the government make such a statement when in the past it had said that it erred on issuing wrong Section 144 CrPC.
On Monday, a CBI special court sentenced Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh to 20 years of rigorous imprisonment for the rape of two women followers between 1999 and 2001. “The sentences shall not run concurrent. It means he shall remain inside the jail for 20 years. The court has also imposed a fine of Rs 30 lakh on the Dera chief, Rs 15 lakh in each of the two cases, which will be payable to the victims,” said H P S Verma, CBI counsel.
