From Our Bureau
NEW DELHI: Just ahead of the Punjab polls, the neighbouring Haryana’s BJP government set free self-styled godman Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh (52), head of Dera Sacha Sauda undergoing 20-year jail for raping two disciples as also life term for killing a journalist, by granting him furlough of 21 days on Monday to supposedly meet his family members in Gurugram.
Deras in Punjab and Haryana have huge following of Dalits and poor and as such they influence the elections. The Congress protested on the sudden release of the Dera Sacha Sauda chief. Ram Rahim, as he is known, has a large number of followers in Punjab, which is going to the polls on February 20. He was patronised by the political leaders and parties in Punjab and Haryana for nearly two decades because of his influence on his followers in the elections.
In the 2014 Lok Sabha polls and the subsequent Haryana Assembly polls, Dera Sacha Sauda, with the Punjab’s prominent sect at Salabatpura in Bathinda, had issued a public appeal for people to vote for the BJP. In the 2017 Punjab Assembly polls, the sect, which claims to have 60 million followers pan-India of which 4 million are in Punjab alone, supported the Shiromani Akali Dal-BJP alliance, but the party lost to the Congress. However, the sect had supported Congress in the previous Punjab Assembly polls in 2012 and 2007.
Followers of Dera Sacha Sauda, if they follow the edict, hold the key to 35-40 seats in Malwa, the largest political region of Punjab with 69 seats out of the state’s 117. His sect has command over as many as 84 campuses, called Satsang Ghars across Punjab.
Ram Rahim is lodged in Haryana’s high security Sunaria jail in Rohtak since 2017 after being convicted in rape and murder cases. He was sentended to 20 years of jail in August 2017 for rapes and murders. His conviction had led to violence in Panchkula and Sirsa, leaving 41 people dead and over 260 injured. A special CBI court in Panchkula also sentenced him in January 2019 to life imprisonment for the murder of journalist Ram Chander Chhatrpati over 16 years ago.
This is fourth time that he is out of jail. He was earlier released thrice for various reasons, including his plea to meet his ailing mother.
Haryana Jail Minister Ranjit Chautala said no politics should be read into Ram Rahim’s release since he was granted parole as per the jail manual and the state government has nothing to do with granting parole or furlough to the jail inmates. He asserted that it is the legal right of a convict to be eligible for parole or furlough after he had completed three years of conviction.
Reacting to his furlough, the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC), the body responsible for the management of gurdwaras, asked the Haryana government to refrain from releasing a criminal responsible for several killings from the jail.
