The Punjab and Haryana High Court on Saturday acquitted Sirsa-based Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh in the murder case of journalist Ram Chander Chhatrapati, over seven years after he was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment by a special CBI court.The appeal of two other accused in the case was dismissed by the Bench of Chief Justice Sheel Nagu and Justice Vikram Aggarwal.The 58-year-old dera chief, however, will remain behind bars as he is serving a 20-year jail term given in 2017 for the rape of two of his disciples. He is lodged in Rohtak’s Sunaria jail.Chhatrapati was shot outside his house in October 2002 in Sirsa after his newspaper ‘Poora Sach’ published an anonymous letter narrating the alleged sexual exploitation of women followers at the dera headquarters in Sirsa. Ram Rahim was named as a conspirator in the journalist’s murder and the case was handed over to the CBI in 2006. The dera chief and three others (one of them died later) were convicted by the special CBI court in Panchkula in January 2019.The High Court relief to Ram Rahim comes weeks after the Bench closely scrutinised evidence following a controversy over the bullets allegedly used in the crime.The Bench had physically examined the fired “Lapua” soft-lead bullet––allegedly bearing forensic expert’s marking and signature–– to see whether it could have been accessed when the plastic container carrying it was said to be sealed with intact AIIMS seals.The main controversy revolved around the defence claim that no one could have accessed the bullet prior to it being opened before the trial court as “both seals” of AIIMS were intact, thereby casting doubt on assertions that the forensic expert had marked or signed the projectile.It was submitted that the bullet recovered from Chhatrapati’s body during the post-mortem examination remained sealed from the moment of recovery till it was opened in court, raising a question over how it was ever examined by the Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL) expert in the first place? The prosecution’s stand in the matter was that the FSL expert’s deposition before the trial court was “very clear”. He had “opened it up and due signatures were there”.Appearing before the Bench, a counsel described the projectile as an “imported Lapua bullet having a soft lead, which is used only for shooting”. It was argued that “a normal bullet would not have soft lead” and, therefore, engravings or markings may not visibly persist over time.Senior counsel R Basant and RS Rai, on the other hand, built the defence case around the integrity of the seals. Reading from the record, the counsel submitted: “The plastic container is duly sealed with two AIIMS seals. Both seals are intact. If the seals are intact, how can anyone have access to the contents of the container?”The Bench, during the course of hearing, had observed that “nothing was visible on these bullets” and sought clarity on whether the signature referred to in the deposition was on the bullet or on the container. The court was told that “so far as the container was concerned, the signatures were there”. As regards the bullet, only the FSL expert could tell about the visibility or existence of signatures, especially given the passage of nearly 23 years and the soft-lead nature of the projectile.