Already behind bars for 20 years in the rape case of two of his followers, the Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh was sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of a Sirsa journalist Ram Chander Chhatrapati by the special court in Panchkula Today.
He was convicted on January 11 by Special CBI Court Judge Jagdeep Singh, along with three others - Kuldeep Singh, Nirmal Singh and Krishan Lal and the quantum was announced today.
The murder case goes back to 2002 after the journalist’s newspaper had published an anonymous letter narrating the ordeal of the rape victims by Dera chief at Dera headquarters in Sirsa.
Journalist Ram Chander Chhatrapati’s newspaper ‘Poora Sach’ had exposed him way before the court punished him last year and to seek revenge, Chhatrapati was shot dead outside his house in 2002 October. The Dera chief was accused as the main conspirator and the journalist's family moved to Punjab and Haryana High Court seeking justice in 2003. The case was given to CBI in 2007.
Dera chief was convicted in the rape case last year which saw massive violence in Panchkula by his followers. Fearing the violence, the CBI court had made the Dera chief attend the hearing from Sunaria jail in Rohtak where he is lodged through the video conferencing. Section-144 was imposed in Panchkula as a precautionary measure by the administration.