Castration case against dera chief: Court allows cross-examination of main witness via video conferencing

CBI Special Magistrate, Haryana, Anil Kumar Yadav, today allowed the cross-examination of the main witness through video conferencing in a case related to castration of followers involving Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh and two doctors as accused.

The witness is presently based in the US. He had moved an application, through his counsel Navkiran Singh, for allowing his cross-examination to be recorded through video conferencing. He had apprehended danger to his life if he appeared physically in the court.

It was on his petition that the Punjab and Haryana High Court in December 2014 directed the CBI to investigate the allegations of mass castration of dera followers in the name of the realisation of God.

The witness had also submitted before the court that since Ram Rahim was being released on parole time and again, even though he was a habitual criminal held guilty in cases, including rape and murder, there was a danger to his life. The witness claims to be a victim of castration.

CBI Senior Public Prosecutor Jaswinder Kumar Bhatti submitted that the CBI had no objection to getting cross-examination of the witness recorded through video conferencing. On the other hand, raising objection, the counsel for dera chief, Amar D Kamra, said it would be “very difficult to cross-examine the witness by putting voluminous records to him through video conferencing, because neither is there any document analyzer nor is there any facility of preserving audio-visual recording of the testimony”.

Another defence counsel, PK Sandhir, argued that the witness had concocted the story of an alleged threat to his life to seek asylum in the US by getting a favourable order from the court.

After hearing the arguments of both sides, the CBI court said that even if the version of witness regarding receipt of any threat perception from the dera chief was not relied upon, even then “the witness has right to move application to get his cross-examination recorded through VC on the ground of long distance of more than 13,000 km, on the ground of incurring of huge travelling expenses and lastly, on the ground of extreme inconvenience likely to be caused to him.”

The court directed the CBI officials “to approach the Ministry of External Affairs for taking assistance of the Indian Consulate in USA and to ensure availability of a secure place there for recording of evidence at a predetermined time,” and added that “if such a facility is not available in the embassy, any other place” could be fixed by the authorities.

The CBI has been further directed to arrange for a document visualiser and equipment for preserving audio-visual recording of the testimony of the witness.

The court also directed the counsel of the witness to provide the e-mail address of the witness since the documents sought to be used for confrontation have to be sent to the witness. The order pointed out that the Supreme Court has promoted and appreciated the use of video conferencing in courts in all proceedings for the benefit of litigants.