Haryana: Dera chief returns to jail after 40-day parole ends
With 14th release since 2020, Ram Rahim exhausts his annual 10 weeks of parole, 21 days furlough limit
Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh, convicted for rape and murder, returned to Rohtak’s Sunaria jail on Monday after completing his 40-day parole.
He was granted parole on August 5, marking his 14th temporary release from the prison since 2020. This release exhausted his annual allowance for temporary leave, which includes 10 weeks of parole and 21 days of furlough.
Before this parole, he had spent 21 days on furlough in April. For the first time, he spent the entire furlough period at the Sirsa-based Dera Sacha Sauda sect and participated in the Dera’s foundation day celebrations on April 29.
Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh was convicted in 2017 for raping two of his disciples and, in 2019, for the murder of a journalist.
Gurmeet Ram Rahim’s paroles and furloughs have shown a pattern where these collide with elections.
On January 28, just eight days before the Delhi assembly elections, the dera chief was released on a 30-day parole. During this, he spent 10 days at the Sirsa-based sect and the remaining at Baghpat Dera in Uttar Pradesh.
On February 28, he was brought back to the Sunaria jail after his parole ended. Before that, he was given a 20-day parole before Haryana went to the polls in October last year. He was also released for 50 days in January last year. He got a 29-day parole in November 2023 before the Rajasthan assembly elections and was out on 30-day parole in July 2023 before the panchayat elections in Haryana.
In October 2022, he got a 40-day parole before the Adampur assembly by-elections in Haryana. Besides, he got a 30-day parole in June 2022 before the Haryana municipal corporation elections and 21-day furlough in February 2022 before the Punjab assembly elections.
On October 24, 2020, Gurmeet Ram Rahim was released from jail from sunrise to sunset to meet his ailing mother at a Gurugram hospital. The release coincided with the Baroda byelection in Sonepat.
