The Punjab and Haryana high court on Thursday reserved its judgment on the appeals from Dera Sacha Sauda (DSS) head Gurmeet Ram Rahim and others in the October 2002 murder of journalist Ram Chander Chhatrapati.
The case, which was reserved for final orders in September 2025, was listed for re-hearing on Thursday before the bench of Chief Justice Sheel Nagu and Justice Vikram Aggarwal owing to “emergence of new facts” and “clarifications” about forensic reports of murder weapon and bullets seized by the CBI. After a brief hearing, it has been reserved again for the final orders.
Chhatrapati was shot from point-blank range at his residence on October 24, 2002, months after the paper published an anonymous letter narrating how women finding solace in the Dera as sadhvis were sexually harassed and raped by the dera chief.
During the hearing, Ram Rahim’s counsels submitted that the bullet recovered from Chhatrapati’s body during the post-mortem examination remained sealed from the time of recovery until it was opened in court. They questioned how the bullet was ever examined by the Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL) expert, when it was produced in court with the hospital seal still intact. It was further claimed that the bullets allegedly recovered did not match the revolver allegedly used in the offence.
However, the CBI counsels had submitted that the FSL expert’s signatures were on the body of the revolver, the drum and the barrel. These could have been engraved only after opening and checking the evidence they submitted.
{{/usCountry}}However, the CBI counsels had submitted that the FSL expert’s signatures were on the body of the revolver, the drum and the barrel. These could have been engraved only after opening and checking the evidence they submitted.
{{/usCountry}}On January 17, 2019, the special CBI court, Panchkula, sentenced Ram Rahim and 3 others to life imprisonment and imposed a fine of ₹50,000. The dera head and others had appealed against the order in 2019 claiming false implication.
Ram Rahim has been convicted for 20 years of jail in two rape cases (2017) and lodged in Sunaria jail of Rohtak. However, the high court in May 2024 had acquitted him in the case of the murder of former dera manager Ranjit Singh in 2002. He is also an accused in multiple FIRs related to 2015 sacrilege incidents pending a probe in Punjab.