Dera Sacha Sauda's IT head accused of evidence tampering, arrested for deleting crucial footage

Intensifying its ongoing probe against controversial ‘godman’ Dera Sacha Sauda chief Ram Rahim Singh, the Haryana Police on Wednesday arrested the sect’s IT head from Sirsa, media reports said.

The IT head has been identified as Sirsa-based Vineet, ANI reported. According to Times Now , Vineet is accused of deleting crucial CCTV footage which could serve as evidence.

Haryana Police arrests #DeraSachaSauda IT head Vineet from Sirsa.

— ANI (@ANI) September 13, 2017

On the information provided by Vineet, Sirsa police seized 60 such hard disks, reported The Tribune .

The report quoted a senior police officer as saying, “During interrogation, he spilt the beans, confessing that the Dera authorities had changed several hard disks before the search operation. A bag containing 60 such disks was found on the basis of inputs provided by him”.

Last week , the authorities conducted searches at the Dera Sacha Sauda headquarters near Sirsa town in Haryana on three consecutive days with hundreds of security personnel and local administration involved in the exercise.

On the first day of the search operation, authorities found computer hard disk drives, an unregistered Lexus car worth one crore, an OB van, Rs 7,000 of demonetised currency, Rs 12,000 cash and some pharma medicines without labels or a brand name, walkie-talkies etc. Five boys, two of whom were minor, were also rescued.

While on the second day , two secret tunnels were found inside the Dera campus that linked Ram Rahim’s residence to a women’s hostel. The team also found several skeletons which pointed to either the killing of dissenters or the sect’s policy to bury the dead within the premises to avoid the pollution of water bodies like the Ganga river.

Ram Rahim was convicted in the 1999 rape cases by a CBI special court in Panchkula on 25 August. He was later sentenced to 20 years of rigorous imprisonment and is lodged in the District Jail at Sunaria near Rohtak.

His conviction led to violence in Panchkula and Sirsa in Haryana, leaving over 30 people dead and 264 injured. Isolated incidents of violence were also reported from Delhi and several other places in Punjab.

With inputs from agencies