AMN / Sirsa
Security forces entered Dera Sacha Sauda headquarters in the morning today and started search and sanitation operations. Deputy Commissioner Prabhjot Singh said 41 companies of paramilitary forces and four columns of the Army have been deployed.
He said the entire Dera premises is to be divided into five sectors for the purpose of searches, each under control of an SP rank officer.
50 videographers and more than a dozen locksmiths. Digging machines were taken inside to look for hidden tunnels.
In the first two hours, a large amount of cash including plastic money, banned currency, hard discs and computers were seized and two rooms were sealed at the Dera Sacha Sauda sect’s headquarters covering around 800 acres.
Bomb squads, commandos, ambulances and fire trucks are on alert for a court-ordered search led by former judge AKS Pawar, who has also taken along 70 witnesses.
During Dera headquarters search operation, police recovered plastic currency used inside the campus.
Ram Rahim, the flamboyant “Guru of Bling” known for his outrageous costumes and “rockstar” lifestyle, was jailed for 20 years last week after he was convicted of raping two followers inside the Dera base.
Dera Sacha Sauda headquarters in Sirsa has a 7-star hotel, an Eiffel Tower replica and shopping complex among other facilities.
The Dera campus is replete with symbols of Ram Rahim’s extravagance and megalomania, with replicas of the Eiffel Tower, Taj Mahal, Kremlin and Disney World created in a seven-star “MSG resort” and giant posters of the Dera chief everywhere. The campus includes an “international school”, shops, a hospital, a stadium, houses and a cinema theatre that screens Ram Rahim’s “MSG” franchise movies.
A pink building known to be Ram Rahim’s notorious “Gufa (cave)” – the house where the women were raped – will be searched.
“The Dera premises is a very huge area and it will take time to complete the entire process,” Haryana police chief BS Sandhu said.
The operation will continue uninterrupted till the search is complete.
The search is being monitored by Court Commissioner AKS Pawar, appointed by the Punjab and Haryana High Court.