The Hindu : Rights groups dispute version on `encounter'

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Jan 28, 2004

Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh

Rights groups dispute version on `encounter'

By Our Staff Reporter

ANANTAPUR, JAN. 27. A fact-finding committee, comprising members of the Andhra Pradesh Civil Liberties Committee (APCLC) and the Organisation for People's Democratic Rights (OPDR), has termed the `encounter' killing of three leaders of the People's War (PW) by the police a couple of days ago `revenge murders.'

The committee, comprising M. Purushottam, district president of the APCLC, and M. Sreenivasulu, M. Yesuratnam and C. Balanallappa of the OPDR, released its report to the press here on Tuesday.

Ridiculing the encounter theory of the police, the panel alleged that the three were killed as part of the police and the Government's decision to kill any naxalite picked up after the Alipiri incident.

The committee said it had interacted with people who were an eyewitness to the picking up of Yerra Satyam, Shivanand and Telangana Ganganna at Chickballapur and Kodikonda check-post.

The panel said that Telangana Ganganna alias Praveen alias Anand was picked up at Kodur check-post around 9 a.m. on January 24 while he was having tea at a hotel.

Eyewitnesses said that Praveen started shouting that he was a naxalite and that the police would kill him in an encounter. He also pleaded with the people there to alert the newspapers. He was taken in a van towards Gorantla.

Yerra Satyam and Shivanand were also picked up on January 24 after they got down from a bus at Sidalaghatta circle in Chickballapur.

The committee concluded that Yerra Satyam and Shivanand were `killed' by the police in Chittoor district, while Praveen was killed at Chundupalli near Rayachoti in Cuddapah district.

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Andhra Pradesh