The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh News : Special court to try faction violence cases

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Jul 16, 2004

Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh

Special court to try faction violence cases

By Our Special Correspondent

HYDERABAD, JULY 15. Grilled by Telugu Desam members over the Proddatur killings yesterday, the Home Minister, K. Jana Reddy, announced two major steps in the Assembly today to deal with factional violence — the setting up of a special court for the speedy trial of the cases and the appointment of a special officer to deal with such situations.

Replying to a debate on the issue, Mr. Jana Reddy condemned the killings and said the Government was sincerely interested in putting an end to factional violence in Cuddapah, Kurnool and Anantapur districts. It would be ruthless in implementing the law and punishing the culprits however big they might be. A manhunt was on by five police teams to apprehend the culprits. The Kurnool DIG was at the spot and investigation was on.

The Home Minister said a case was booked under Sections 147, 148, 324 and 302 read with Section 149 of the IPC. The Government would try to get evidence from arrested persons indicating the involvement of the accused in other cases also, if any, and accordingly add more sections later. He objected to Telugu Desam members projecting the incident as having been caused by Congress leaders out of `political rivalry', and stated that it was due to disputes between two families.

The Chief Minister, Y. S. Rajasekhara Reddy, intervened to state that the attack was non-political as testified by the arrested persons. He ridiculed the suggestion by T. Devender Goud that he (Dr. Reddy) shed the tag of faction leader and protect TD leaders who faced threats. Congress members vociferously protested against Mr. Goud's comments, and demanded their withdrawal. Dr. Reddy said the incident was not due to dereliction of duty by the police but a cumulative result of lack of employment opportunities in villages and rural backwardness. Mr. Jana Reddy earlier referred to the consistent demand made by the Leader of the Opposition, N. Chandrababu Naidu, to give protection to three Telugu Desam MLAs who faced threats — P. Keshavulu, E. Dayakar Rao and Paritala Ravi — and said security risks of MLAs would be reviewed by the existing committee and gunmen provided accordingly. The Home Minister rebutted the charge made by Mr. Naidu blaming the Congress for the incident, reeling out statistics according to which there were 390 political murders during 1989-94 when the Congress was in power.

But in 192 cases, the victims were Congress workers. Compared to this, there were 964 murders during the Telugu Desam period and in 445 cases, the victims were again from the Congress.

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