A fire cracker factory hiding in plain sight as a ‘care’ facility for bovines, and secret tunnels connecting his exclusive gufa (cave) to the residential quarters of his female disciples were discovered by security personnel during their ongoing ‘sanitisation operation’ of Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh's headquarters here on Saturday.
Day 2 of the court-monitored exercise at the convicted Dera Sacha Sauda leader’s chosen seat of power, the 700-acre Satlokpur Dham, which commenced around 7 a.m., also revealed empty cartons used to store ammunition magazines for AK-47 assault rifles, according to multiple sources.
Like Friday, the second round of sanitisation on Saturday was led, videographed and overseen by retired District and Sessions Judge, A.K.S. Pawar, who was appointed Court Commissioner by the Punjab and Haryana High Court for the purpose earlier this week, with over 5,000 local police personnel and 41 companies of the paramilitary deployed at 16 check points to enforce prohibitory orders at the Dera and its immediate vicinity.
“The cracker factory bore a sign board denoting it as a ‘Cattle Care Centre’ but it turned out to be a cracker factory where 84 boxes of explosive material were found. The facility has been sealed and a case under relevant sections of the Explosives Act has been registered against its owner, who is yet to be identified,” Satish Mehra, Deputy Director of the Haryana Information and PR department, told The Hindu. Mr. Mehra added that two access corridors or tunnels connecting Singh’s cave to the residential quarters of his female disciples or sadhvis, were also unearthed.
Free access
Though Mr. Mehra did not divulge more information, a government source claimed the tunnels would provide “unhindered access” to Singh to as many as 200 female disciples at “any point of time”. The other tunnel, according to the source, was made of fibreglass. It connected Singh’s gufa to a point an estimated five kilometres away and seemed to be “an exclusive entry/exit point.”