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Derogatory posters case: SIT submits CFSL writing sample report of one sacrilege accused in court
The analysis report of handwriting samples of dera follower Sukhjinder Singh alias Sunny, who is an accused in three sacrilege cases, was received from the Central Forensic Science Laboratory (CFSL) at Chandigarh in a sealed envelope
Punjab Police’s special investigation team (SIT) probing the 2015 sacrilege cases on Thursday submitted the forensic analysis report of handwriting samples of a dera Sacha Sauda follower in a Faridkot court in connection with the 2015 derogatory posters case.
The analysis report of handwriting samples of dera follower Sukhjinder Singh alias Sunny, who is an accused in three sacrilege cases, was received from the Central Forensic Science Laboratory (CFSL) at Chandigarh in a sealed envelope, which has been submitted to the court of judicial magistrate Tarjani by the SIT. The court will open the report on October 27 during the hearing on the charge sheet filed by the SIT against the accused.
In May this year, the SIT led by inspector general of police Surinder Pal Singh Parmar arrested four dera followers — Sukhjinder, Shakti Singh, Ranjit Singh and Baljeet Singh — saying the posters were pasted by them on the directions of dera’s three national committee members.
On June 1, the SIT collected samples of Sukhjinder to match them with the writing on the posters claiming that one of the posters was written by him, and sent samples to CFSL for matching.
If the handwriting of the accused matches with the posters, it will be crucial evidence for the SIT to prove their claim in court. An official privy to the development said the SIT was confident the handwriting samples will match.
The SIT led by then deputy inspector general (DIG) Ranbir Singh Khatra in 2018 had claimed that the handwriting of the accused dera followers had matched with the posters but no report was submitted to the court. Later, the CBI in its closure report filed in a Mohali court in July 2019 said the handwriting samples of the accused dera followers it had sent to the CFSL in Delhi did not match with the posters.
As per the closure report of the CBI, the fingerprints and specimens of handwritings of 49 people were collected during the investigation. The CFSL report was received pertaining to 10 people, including all the dera followers named accused in this case by the SIT.
However, SIT filed a nine-point opinion on the closure report of the CBI, saying that without waiting for the report of the remaining 39 persons, the agency made a hurry in filing the closure report. “Also, CFSL report mentions that the expert was not having sufficient material on record for scientific examination of fingerprints on posters with the samples sent,” the SIT claimed.
In the three posters that appeared at Bargari and Burj Jawahar Singh Wala villages on September 24-25, 2015, it was threatened that the “bir” (copy) of Guru Granth Sahib stolen from Burj Jawahar Singh Wala on June 1 that year would be torn if the Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim-starrer film Messenger of God (MSG)-2 was not allowed to be released in Punjab.
Parmar-led SIT has also claimed in the charge sheet that there are two witnesses who saw the four accused dera followers pasting derogatory posters at Bur Jawahar Singh Wala and Bargari villages on September 24, 2015.
