Rohtak: Self-styled jailed godman and Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh was granted regular parole of 30 days by the Haryana Government on Thursday. With this, the Haryana government has once again approved parole of the rape convict godman who was previously granted parole in January this year.
Ram Rahim headed to his dera at Barwana in Uttar Pradesh’s Baghpat district — the place where he had spent his previous parole in January this year. He had applied for parole under Section 3 of the Haryana Good Conduct Prisoners (Temporary Release) Act, 2022. However, he has been granted parole with conditions.
As per the order, Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh will reside at the Shah Satnam Ashram in Uttar Pradesh’s Bagpat district during the parole period. The order further said that the authorities also put several conditions on Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh including, the condition to obtain prior permission from the district magistrate (DM) to visit any place not specified in the release warrant during the parole period. ‘The prisoner shall during the period of temporary release keep peace and maintain good behaviour’, the order said directing him to cooperate with the police and the local administration.
The release warrant also directed the local police station to keep a close watch on the activities of Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh during the 30-day parole period. Earlier, in January, Ram Rahim was granted 40 days of parole. He has been incarcerated, since 2017, in Haryana’s Sunaria jail where he is serving a 20-year term for raping two women disciples at his ashram’s headquarters in Sirsa. Earlier in February, the Dera chief was granted three weeks’ furlough.
While parole means the release of a prisoner either temporarily for a special purpose or completely before the expiry of a sentence, on the promise of good behaviour, a furlough is a short-term temporary release of convicts from jail. He was convicted by a special CBI court in Panchkula in August 2017 for raping two women followers. CBI had registered the case on the orders passed by the High Court of Punjab and Haryana in 2003 and taken over the investigation of the case earlier registered at Police Station Sadar in Kurukshetra.
It was alleged that Ranjit Singh, a resident of village Khanpur Kolian, Kurukshetra was murdered on July 10, 2002, when he was working in his fields at village Khanpur Kolian of District Kurukshetra in Haryana. After a thorough investigation, CBI filed a charge sheet in 2007 against six accused and charges were framed in 2008 while, on October 8, 2021, the court convicted Rahim and four others in connection with former Dera manager Ranjit Singh’s murder case.
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