Chandigarh: The trial proceedings against the Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh and others in sacrilege cases re-started in a local court here on Thursday. The Punjab and Haryana High Court had imposed a stay on the proceedings which was vacated by the Supreme Court last month. The Punjab government had challenged the high court stay on the trial before the top court in March this year.
The controversial Sirsa-based Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh, who is a convict in rape and murder case and lodged in Sunaria jail in Rohtak district of Haryana since 2017, was presented before the court through video-conferencing from the Sunaria jail. The Dera chief counsels prayed before the court for directions to supply the deficient documents.
It may be recalled that the trial against Dera chief and some Dera followers in three inter-linked cases of sacrilege of Guru Granth Sahib in 2015 was transferred from Faridkot court to Chandigasrh in 2023 on the directions of the Supreme Court.
It was after the accused approached the top court seeking the transfer of the trial to a court outside Punjab after one of the accused in sacrilege cases was shot dead in Kotkapura town of Punjab’s Faridkot district.
For record, three interlinked cases of sacrilege were registered by the Punjab police after a holy “bir’’ (scripture) of Guru Granth Sahib was stolen from a Faridkot village in June 2015; this incident was followed by two more incidents – pasting of objectionable posters and torn pages of stolen “bir’’ in Bargari and Burj Jawahar Wala villages, in September and October that year. A special investigating team (SIT) constituted by the state police, had named the Dera chief as the main conspirator in the said cases.
