Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh, a spiritual leader in India, has been charged for forcing more than 400 followers to undergo castration.

He was charged by Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).

“The charge sheet against 50-year-old Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh was filed by CBI in a special court Thursday,” a senior police official said Friday.

The charge sheet was filed by the CBI nearly three years after the Punjab and Haryana High Court ordered an investigation by the country’s premier probe agency into allegations of forced castration against the spiritual guru levelled by one of his former followers.

The petitioner had claimed that Singh forced over 400 followers to undergo castration at a hospital in his sect’s headquarters in the northern state of Haryana to “get closer to God.”

Singh is the head of the Dera Sacha Sauda sect, which claims to have 60 million followers around the world.

He is currently serving 20 years in jail for raping two women devotees in Haryana.

Singh is also facing trial in two murder cases.

If convicted, he could get a maximum of death penalty.

(Xinhua/NAN)