Thousands of Dera followers went on rampage in Panchkula and other parts of north India after a special CBI court held their leader and self-styled godman, Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh, guilty of rape.
Meanwhile, one man back home in Sirsa is not enraged by this conviction. He, on the other hand, probably welcomes it.
Anshul Chhatrapati, who runs the local Hindi newspaper Poora Sach, is no fan of Ram Rahim Singh. It was his father, 15 years ago, who published an anonymous letter in Poora Sach in which a woman accused Singh of sexual assault.
Anshul's father was murdered for bringing the rape case out in the open and now his son, scared for his life, is fighting for justice.
Catch all the live updates on the Dera violence here.
Now Chhatrapati's murder case has reached its final stages in the same CBI court in Panchkula as the one that will deliver the verdict on rape charged against Ram Rahim.
Ram Chander Chhatrapati was shot at point-blank range on 24 October 2002, mere months after his paper published an anonymous letter written by a Dera sadhvi (nun) and addressed to then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, reported Daily Mail.
But it has been a long legal battle for Anshul, who was only 21 years old when his father was killed. According to Hindustan Times, Chhatrapati named the Dera chief as an accused in his FIR while on his death bed, but the police did not include his name.
Speaking to Hindustan Times, Anshul said,
My father fought for life in the hospital for 28 days after they pumped bullets into his body, and he had named the Dera chief as the accused in his statement to the local police. But the cops did not include the Dera chief’s name in the FIR, and the legal battle began from there.
Today, Anshul is ridden with nerves as he tightens security around his house fearing retribution.
Ram Rahim also has another murder charge against him, the killing of former Dera member Ranjit Singh, allegedly by some other members, for exposing wrongdoings at the organisation's headquarters in Sirsa.
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