The Punjab and Haryana high court on Wednesday directed Punjab to supply all evidences and statements, other than case diaries, in 2015 sacrilege cases to Dera Sacha Sauda head Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh.
The directions were given by high court bench of justice Anoop Chitkara, while hearing his plea filed on May 15. These documents are to be supplied within seven days, said one of the lawyers, senior advocate Chetan Mittal, who appeared for the dera head. However, a detailed order is awaited.
Ram Rahim had filed the petition challenging May 4 order passed by a Chandigarh court, whereby his application seeking investigation record of the CBI in the three FIRs pertaining to the sacrilege cases was dismissed. The three cases reported in 2015 are being probed by the Punjab police after in 2019, the state withdrew consent to CBI in these FIRs and probe was handed over to a state SIT.
As per a plea in January 2021, the high court had passed an order directing the state to place evidence collected by both the agencies — CBI and SIT — to the magistrate of Faridkot, where trial was underway. However, an application filed seeking these records was dismissed by the Chandigarh court on May 4.
The trial in 2015 sacrilege incidents was transferred from Punjab to the Chandigarh court upon orders from the Supreme Court in February this year.
{{/usCountry}}The trial in 2015 sacrilege incidents was transferred from Punjab to the Chandigarh court upon orders from the Supreme Court in February this year.
{{/usCountry}}In response to the plea, the state had stated that the record was already a part of the challan.
Three interlinked FIRs were registered in 2015. The first FIR was registered on June 2, 2015 which is regarding theft of a ‘bir’ of Guru Granth Sahib from Burj Jawahar Singh Wala village on June 1, 2015. The second was registered on September 25, 2015, after derogatory posters were put up at Bargari and the third FIR was registered on October 12, 2015 as torn pages of a ‘bir’ were found scattered near Bargari gurdwara.
Besides Ram Rahim, there are seven other persons named in the FIR, with Ram Rahim being the “main conspirator” as per the report to trial court by the SIT led by inspector general of police SPS Parmar.