NON-POLL FACTOR: Once-politically influential sect losing ability to swing electoral fortunes as its representatives maintain a stoic silence when parties are out on the hustings for the Oct 21 polls A once-powerful sect having the ability to sway millions of followers in the blink of an eye, a cult looked upon by politicians for its “electoral blessings” and pampered by successive governments, the Sirsa-based Dera Sacha Sauda now seems to have become a shadow of its past.