5 Police Personnel Dismissed For Trying To Free Dera Chief

Five Haryana policemen, who were part of Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh's security and were charged with sedition, were dismissed from service on Thursday.

Sedition and attempt to murder charges were slapped against seven persons, including the five police personnel, in charge of the Dera chief's security when he had arrived at Panchkula to appear in a CBI court on Friday. They had allegedly tried to free the Dera chief when he was brought outside the Panchkula Court complex, after a special CBI court convicted him in a 15-year-old rape case. They were produced before a court on Wednesday, which sent them to seven days in police remand.

The arrested police personnel were in the ranks of sub- inspector, assistant sub-inspector, head constable and constable. The conviction of the Dera head in the 2002 rape case had triggered arson and violence in Haryana that claimed 36 lives and injured over 250 people.