The Punjab and Haryana High Court on Saturday acquitted Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim of the October 2002 murder of journalist Ram Chander Chhatrapati.
Chhatrapati was shot at point-blank range at his residence on 24 October 2002. The killing came months after the newspaper published an anonymous letter describing how women who had joined the dera as sadhists were sexually harassed and raped by the dera leader.
On January 17, 2019, the special CBI court in Panchkula sentenced Ram Rahim and three others to life imprisonment and imposed a fine of Rs. $50,000. The abbot and other defendants appealed the order in 2019, claiming they were wrongly implicated.
Ram Rahim has been serving a 20-year prison sentence in two rape cases since 2017 and is in Sonaria prison in Rohtak, Haryana. However, in May 2024, the Supreme Court acquitted him of the 2002 murder case of former Dera administrator Ranjit Singh. His name was also mentioned in several FIRs linked to the 2015 sacrilege incidents which are still under investigation in Punjab.
