New Delhi: Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim, who is currently lodged at the Sunaria jail in Haryana’s Rohtak, for raping two of his disciples, was on Monday granted furlough for three weeks.


The Dera Sacha Sauda chief has, however, been asked not to visit the organisation’s headquarters in Sirsa.


Ram Rahim has also been asked not meet his followers and stay at his farmhouse in Gurugram.


The Gurugram Police will take full responsibility of the Dera Sacha Sauda chief’s security during the 21-day furlough.


Ram Rahim had applied for furlough with the Divisional Commissioner of Sirsa earlier on January 31 to stay with his family.


He had earlier been given emergency paroles several times to meet his ailing mother.


The Dera Sacha Sauda chief, along with two female followers, is serving a 20-year jail sentence over rape charges.


He was convicted for rape by a special Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) court earlier in August 2017.


Ram Rahim has also been sentenced to life imprisonment in the murder case of Dera manager Ranjit Singh along with four others.


The CBI special court in Panchkula had earlier on October 8 last year convicted the Dera Sacha Sauda chief and four co-accused under Section 302 (murder) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).


Ranjit Singh was murdered earlier on July 10, 2002, for his suspected role in the circulation of an anonymous letter, which exposed how women were being sexually exploited by the Dera head.


Earlier in 2019, the Dera Sacha Sauda chief and three others were pronounced guilty of the murder of journalist Ramchandra Chhatrapati, who had published an anonymous letter about the sexual exploitation of women by Ram Rahim Singh at his ashram.