The Central Bureau of Investigation on Thursday filed a chargesheet against jailed Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh and two of his aides in the court of special judicial magistrate Kapil Rathi in Haryana’s Panchkula city for allegedly castrating several followers of the camp.
The Special Investigation Team of the Haryana Police had arrested one of those two aides of Ram Rahim – a qualified surgeon named Mahinder Pal Singh – when it was investigating the violence that followed the Dera chief’s conviction for rape in August. He is accused of castrating at least 300 followers of Dera Sacha Sauda. The other accused is Dr Pankaj Garg.
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The agency has filed the chargesheet three years after the Punjab and Haryana High Court ordered it to probe the charges based on a petition. The petitioner, a former Dera follower named Hans Raj Chauhan, had told the court that he and 400 followers were castrated inside the Dera premises. He claimed that they were told that it would help them realise God.
On August 28, 2017, a special court of the Central Bureau of Investigation in Panchkula had sentenced Ram Rahim to 20 years in jail for sexually assaulting two female followers. At least 41 people died in the violence that had followed his conviction in the rape cases three days earlier. Ram Rahim is also facing two murder trials.
