The Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) on Friday asked Punjab chief minister Bhagwant Mann to allow the prosecution of Sirsa dera head Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh on the charges of outraging religious feelings and arrest his aide Honeypreet along with fellow sacrilege accused Pradeep Kler who has two pending cases.
Shiromani Akali Dal’s Parambans Singh Romana said the CM should disclose his “deal” behind more than two years of delay in ordering this saction.He alleged that: “Mann has followed in the footsteps of the state’s previous Congress govt, so the special intvestigation team’s (SIT’s) application to prosecute Ram Rahim under Section 295-A (hurting religious sentiments) is pending since Sept 2021.”
Romana asked the chief minister why the dera head couldn’t be prosecuted when all the other accused could be. He asked him if this was because of the coming elections in Haryana. He alleged that: “This is also why Honeypreet has not been nominated or arrested, even though Kler had named her as main accused while recording in his statement before a magistrate more than six months ago.”
Romana said the three FIRs (first information reports) against Kler related to theft of a replica of Guru Granth Sahib, pasting posters that dared Sikhs to save their holy book, and then tearing its replica and scattering its pages.
He said: “Despite this, Kler was arrested only on the charges of theft, even though all the three cases were registered at the Bajakhana police station. It is clear that Kler is also being blackmailed into submitting tutored statements to avert arrest in the two remaining cases.”
He also accused former chief ministers Capt Amarinder Singh and Charanjit Singh Channi, and former state home minister Sukhjinder Randhawa of protecting the dera head, Honeypreet, and Kler in the past. Romana charged Mann with doing the same, alleging that: “All of them struck deals with the Sirsa dera at the cost of Sikh community’s sentiments.”
