A special Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) court in Haryana’s Panchkula will on Monday pronounce the quantum of sentence for Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim, who has been convicted of conspiring to murder his former manager Ranjit Singh in 2002.
The order is likely to be pronounced by afternoon after a round of arguments. The authorities have prohibited the assembly of over four people and carrying of arms in Panchkula district in view of the violence after Rahim’s conviction in rape cases in August 2017 that left 36 people dead.
Security deployment has been scaled up in and around the district courts. Rahim is due to appear in the court through video conferencing from Sunaria jail of Rohtak, where he is serving a 20-year term for raping two followers.
The CBI has sought a death sentence for Rahim, who has pleaded for mercy.
The special court convicted him and four others on October 8 in the murder case.
Ranjit Singh, a former follower of Ram Rahim, was shot dead on July 10, 2002, at Khanpur Kolian village in Haryana’s Kurukshetra.
According to the CBI, Ranjit Singh was murdered as Rahim suspected that he was behind the circulation of an anonymous letter about the sexual exploitation of woman followers at the dera. In June 2002, Ranjit Singh was summoned to the dera and threatened with dire consequences, but he refused to seek pardon, saying he had done nothing wrong.
Rahim has also been sentenced to life for the murder of a journalist in 2002.