Dara Singh (Bajrang Dal)
Dara Singh is a serial killer, a Bajrang Dal activist and a Bhartiya Janata Party advocate. He shot into limelight after he was convicted for leading a mob and setting fire to the station wagon in which the Australian Christian missionary Graham Staines and his two children were sleeping, which burned them alive, at Orissa.
Singh was also charged in the murder of Muslim trader Shaikh Rehman, he chopped off his arms before setting him ablaze at Padibeda village in Karanjia sub-division of Mayurbhanj district. He was also convicted in the murder of a Christian priest, Fr. Arul Das, in Jamboni village in the same district. The priest was killed by an arrow during his escape, after his church was set on fire.
Singh was arrested after an year long chase on January 2000 after the murder of Graham Staines and is now serving his life sentence in prison.
Early life
Dara Singh was born as Ravinder Kumar Pal, the son of Mihilal Pal of Kakor Village, Etawah district in Uttar Pradesh. He has an elder brother who was employed in the National Thermal Power Corporation and four married sisters. He has a first-class degree in arts and is also well-versed in Hindi. He stayed at Delhi for a brief period of time where he worked in a grocery business. In 1989, he moved to Maliposhi in Orissa, after he got a job as a Hindi teacher at a local School.Political life
The Police reported that Dara Singh was an active member of the Go Suraksha Samiti, an initiative, financed and implemented by the Vishwa Hindu Parishad and the Bajrang Dal. Singh was also involved in the Bhartiya Janata Party and known to have campaigned for the party during the 1998 elections and also been involved in Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh rallies and camps. Lalith Das, a former superintendent of police of Keonjhar district, said Dara Singh's association with the BJP is very well known. Singh was also alleged to have worked for the Bhartitya Janata party during the 1991 elections in Patna. According to the Government council, Dara Singh attended RSS camps, he professed himself as a Bajrang Dal activist and believed in the strong propagation of Hindutva.Criminal activities
Dara Singh's base of operations was the relatively affluent Padiabeda village in Mayurbhanj district, a Hindu nationalist stronghold. Singh was involved in the cow protection movement of the Bajrang Dal and targeted Muslim cattle traders.He was charged in several cases where he hijacked and looted trucks which carried cows to slaughter. He then redistributed the looted cows among the locals, he had achieved a degree of popularity among the tribals and was also becoming a political figure. Some of the villagers also gave him shelter after he was on the run for more than a year during the Graham Staines case. He had a small loyal band that was increasingly involved in violent opposition to what they perceived as anti-Hindu forces.
In September 1998, a cattle truck was looted and torched, and the trucker's assistant, Shaikh Imam was battered to death in Godabhanga Ghati in the Mayurbhanj district. Singh was charged in this case and eventually acquitted in October 2006, due to lack of sufficient evidence and hostile witnesses.
On 26 November 1999, Shaikh Rahman, a Muslim garment merchant was beaten and had his hands severed, before being burned to death at Padiabeda village by more than 20 men armed with machetes. His body was then set aflame and incinerated, to prevent his family members from recovering it and the garment stall was also set ablaze. Singh and his associate, Buluram Mohanty was indicted in connection with this killing. In October 2007, Singh was convicted of the murder and was sentenced to life imprisonment, while the 23 others were acquitted on grounds of insufficient evidence.
In September 1999,a Catholic priest, Arul Das was murdered with an arrow shot in Jamabani village of the Mayurbhanj district by a gang led by Dara Singh. Later, the Church was also burnt down. Singh was convicted in this case and sentenced to life imprisonment in September 2007, along with associates Chena Hao, Rajkishore Mohanta, and Jadunath Mohanta.
Graham Staines murder
On 22 January 1999, a mob led by Dara Singh attacked the station wagon inhabited by Graham Staines and his two sons, Philip and Timothy at Manoharpur village in Keonjhar district, Orissa. Chanting "Jai Bajarang Bali", the mob set fire to the station wagon and the Staines' were burned to death. Dara Singh does not appear to have used any legal remedy against being troubled by any of Staines activities that would have provoked him into killing the missionary and his minor sons. Other perpetrators in the killing of Graham Staines included Bhimasen Mahanta, Rajat Das, Mahendra Hembram and Chenchu Hansda. The Central Bureau of Investigation had chargesheeted a total of 18 persons in the case in June 1999. Of those formally sentenced to life imprisonment, only Hembram was acquitted. In September 2003, the Khordha Sessions Court sentenced Dara Singh to death for his role in the murders.Subsequent to his arrest, his supporters formed several organisations, including Dara Singh Parijan Suraksha Samiti, Dharmarakhyak Sri Dara Singh Bachao Samiti, and Dara Sena, claiming to espouse his cause. These groups describe him as the saviour of Hinduism. There was also a "Free Dara Singh" website. Several small booklets with titles like Mono Ku Chhui Gola, or Mu Dara Singh Kahuchi, eulogising Dara and criticising the activities of Staines and other Christian missionaries, are circulating in the region.
The Wadhwa Commission stated that the Bajrang Dal was not involved in the murder of Staines, justifying its non-examination of the role of the Bajrang Dal on the grounds that the Dal was a peaceful and legal organization. However, the National Commission for minorities disputed the commison's finding and highlighted Singh's connections with the Bajrang Dal. The NCM also suggested that the killers were from Bajrang Dal as the attackers cheered "long live the Bajrang Dal" before the attacks.
Arrest
At-least 11 squads of a special task force of the state police constantly patrolled some of the toughest jungle terrains of Mayurbhanj-Keonjhar region for over an year in search of him after the Staines murder. He always had the support of the local tribals and was always on the move, provoking communal passions all over the area. The police and CBI also put up a bounty of ₹8 lakhs on his head which too did not help. The police started the "Operation Confinement", and the plan was to confine him and cut off his escape roads in the jungles. The police arrested Dara singh after a year long chase at the night of January 31, 2000.Court verdicts
On April 5, 2003, an accused Dayanidhi Patra said to the court that he was present at the time when Dara Singh set fire to the wagon. On September 22, 2003, The trial court convicted all the accused and sentenced them to various jail terms, except Dara Singh who was given the death penalty.In May 2005, the Orissa High Court set aside the death sentence, stating that it could not be demonstrated that any specific action by Singh himself had caused the deaths. On 19 March 2007, the Supreme Court issued notice to the CBI on a petition filed by Mahendra Hembram challenging the Orissa High Court verdict, citing his confessional statement before the trial court, in which he had said that he killed Graham Staines, should be considered in total.
In August 2005, Singh filed a special leave petition with the apex court, seeking acquittal. He asserted that his case was based on hearsay and circumstantial evidence, claiming that he had not led the killings. The Supreme Court of India admitted his appeal in October 2005. In February 2007, Singh petitioned the Supreme Court to release him on bail, stating that he was the primary livelihood earner in his family, including his dependent 75-year-old mother. In October 2007, his petition was denied by the Supreme Court.
On 21 January 2011, The Supreme Court upheld the life imprisonment for Dara Singh by the Orissa High Court and his accomplice Mahender Hembram. The Supreme Court dismissed the CBI's call for the death penalty, explaining that the death penalty could only be imposed in the "rarest of rare" cases.