CHANDIGARH: In a major setback to the CBI, the Punjab and Haryana high court on Saturday acquitted Gurmeet Ram Rahim, the controversial head of Sirsa based Dera Sacha Sauda, in connection with the journalist Ram Chander Chhatrapati murder case. Division bench comprising Chief Justice Sheel Nagu and Justice Vikram Aggarwal passed these orders while allowing the appeal of Dera Chief. The bench, however, has upheld the conviction of three other accused in this case.The operative part of the judgement was pronounced in the open court. However, the detailed copy of the judgement was not available till the filing of this case.On January 17, 2019, the special CBI court Panchkula had sentenced the self-styled godman and three others to life imprisonment and imposed a fine of Rs 50,000. They were sentenced for the 2002 murder of Sirsa-based journalist Ram Chander Chhatrapati, the editor of ‘Poora Sach’ newspaper.Aggrieved from the orders, the Dera Chief had challenged the conviction before the HC claiming that he has been falsely implicated by the CBI in this case as the first charge sheet against other accused, Nirmal, Kuldeep and Krishan Lal had already been filed and none of them had named the appellant to be involved in the conspiracy, therefore there was no other circumstance left with the CBI to introduce the overhearing of conspiracy. “It is a matter of fact that the appellant was not at all named in the first charge sheet filed by State Police in 2002. Krishan Lal was tortured by the CBI Officials. The name of the Dera chief was thereafter included as an accused by way of revenge. The eyewitness version of the conspiracy was created by senior CBI officer, M Narayanan for the present case in the form of Khatta Singh,” the counsel for Dera chief had submitted. It was also submitted that the version of Khatta Singh that the conspiracy was hatched only in his presence and that he did not disclose about the same to anyone stands falsified by the admission of IO, M Narayanan in his cross examination.Counsel further stated that the Dera chief has been convicted only by stating that he had a motive against the deceased and he nursed a grudge against the deceased as he was publishing an evening newspaper by the name ‘Poora Sach’ and had been actively reporting against Dera. “The investigating agency however, failed to prove by leading even an iota of evidence that the appellant ever read the said newspaper. As per the prosecution’s own story, the newspaper being published by the deceased was an evening newspaper and it only reported the news which had already been published by the morning newspapers. There was thus, no question of the appellant, having any grudge against the deceased,” the dera chief had submitted. The CBI, as well as the counsel representing the deceased journalist’s family had strongly opposed the Dera Chief’s plea. Finally hearing all the parties, the HC in September last year had reserved its verdict in the matter.The Dera chief is incarcerated in Rohtak’s Sunaria jail since August 2017 after he was sentenced to 20 years in jail for rapes of two female devotees.