ANOTHER KHATTAR COP-OUT
THE GLARING INABILITY TO CONTAIN THE RAMPAGING SACHA SAUDA SUPPORTERS HAS PUT THE HARYANA GOVERNMENT’S INTENTIONS AND PRIORITIES IN QUESTION
Thirty-eight men, women and children are dead. Scores are being treated in hospitals for injuries sustained in the violence that erupted in Haryana’s Panchkula town on August 25, the day a CBI special court pronounced Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh guilty on two counts of rape.
The bloodletting had been predicted. As Yogendra Yadav, national president of Swaraj Abhiyan, says, “You had the date, the time, the exact place and the identity of those waiting to indulge in violence. What more did you need (to take action)?” But it was clearly not enough to stir Haryana chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar. Thirty-four months into his tenure, he cannot possibly cite lack of experience in governance as the reason behind the failure to contain the violence.
Khattar has faltered twice earlier. In November 2014, when his government was called upon to execute the high courtordered arrest of Rampal, a Kabirpanthi sect leader, who had surrounded himself with 50,000 adherents at his dera in Hisar. Khattar’s indecision on how to proceed led to an 18-day standoff between the police and the godman’s followers, ending in the death of six people. In February 2016, the Haryana government’s ineptitude was back on display when Jats demanding quotas went on the rampage, resulting in the loss of 30 lives.
In Gurmeet Singh’s case, as the Punjab and Haryana High Court observed on August 24, there were indications of wilful collusion between the Khattar government and those at the helm of Dera Sacha Sauda. With the verdict officially slated for August 25, his administration had more than a forewarning. Despite prohibitory orders, an estimated 100,000 dera supporters had gathered near the Panchkula courts. This
amid telling statements by senior BJP leaders—state education minister Ram Bilas Sharma insisted “there’s no Section 144 on shraddha (faith)”. A day before the verdict, Haryana’s advocate general Baldev Raj Mahajan admitted in the high court to a ‘clerical mistake’ in the prohibitory orders issued whereby only people with weapons were barred from assembling in Panchkula. Speaking to reporters a day earlier, state director general of police B.S. Sandhu had stated that “Section 144 was imposed only to stop people from carrying weapons”. On the ground, as it became painfully evident from the violence, the Haryana police had desisted from even a cursory search of the dera followers. Many among them were carrying bottles filled with petrol, rods and had also stocked up on stones and bricks.
Emerging hours after the violence, Khattar blamed the mayhem on a few “miscreants” amid the crowd of adherents assembled for “darshan of their guru”. His government’s response—from allowing Gurmeet Singh to drive to the Panchkula courts in a 200-strong motorcade to deputy advocate general G.S. Salwara carrying the convicted dera chief’s bags to Gurmeet Singh’s ‘adopted daughter’ Honeypreet Kaur accompanying him on the helicopter that flew him to Rohtak jail—provoked the judges to remark that the Khattar government appeared to have “surrendered before the followers of Dera Sacha Sauda for political considerations”.
It was an allusion to just how cosy Khattar and his government have been with the dera. Just 10 days before the conviction, ministers Ram Bilas Sharma and Anil Vij paid their respects on the dera chief’s 50th birthday with a Rs 51 lakh gift cheque.
Though just as critical of the violence in Panchkula, Pramod Kumar, a Chandigarh-based political scientist, points out that the administration did well in bringing the dera chief to court on August 25. He says the alternative prospect of Gurmeet Singh holing up in his well-stocked, fortress-like dera, surrounded by hundreds of thousands of followers, would have been far more problematic. “It would have meant an endless stand-off and possibly resulted in many more deaths,” says Kumar.
On August 15, the dera chief’s 50th birthday, two Haryana ministers offered him a gift cheque of Rs 51 lakh