The Hindu : Opinion / Editorials : ANDHRA PRADESH'S CULT OF VIOLENCE

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Wednesday, Jan 26, 2005

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ANDHRA PRADESH'S CULT OF VIOLENCE

THE GRISLY KILLING, in broad daylight and in the party office, of the Telugu Desam Party MLA, Paritala Ravi, by a yet-to-be identified gang calls attention yet again to the cult of violence and faction-ridden politics in Andhra Pradesh. The Anantapur legislator, who broke away from the Naxalite movement in 1992 to join the TDP, was no stranger to violence — at both ends, administering and receiving — in the theatre of Rayalaseema politics. There were approximately 40 criminal cases pending against him. There were several attempts on his life — his closest brush with death was in 1997 when a car bomb exploding in Jubilee Hills in Hyderabad took 26 lives. Maddelacheruvu Suryanarayana Reddy, whose relative's family was wiped out in a television set explosion, was sentenced last year to life imprisonment for his role in the 1997 carnage. That incident seemed to typify the brutal factional-political feuding that, over the years, has taken a heavy toll of life and well-being in several parts of Andhra Pradesh. Paritala Ravi, who lived and died by the gun, was a key actor in the Rayalaseema edition of this sordid and continuing drama.

The violence that has rocked the State and the damage to public property in the ensuing protest have cost not just the State Government dear; ordinary people too have been put to great hardship. The fact that the TDP was holding its district-level meetings on Monday for its membership drive added strength to the spontaneous reaction. On Tuesday, Andhra Pradesh observed yet another bandh that disrupted public life. It is high time political parties in the State got together and evolved a consensus to end the culture of settling personal, political, land, and all other disputes through the instrumentality of the gun and the bomb. Telugu Desam as well as Congress functionaries have fallen victim in the process. Chief Minister Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy, who hails from Cuddapah district, lost his father to this benighted culture. Several speculative theories are being advanced for Ravi's murder — it could be a sequel to the 1997 assassination attempt, it could be a settling of personal scores in the region, or it could just be internal rivalry. What has been established so far is that the job was carried out by contract killers.

Not surprisingly, the TDP has asked for the resignation of the Chief Minister and for entrusting the investigation to the Central Bureau of Investigation. For his part, Dr. Rajasekhara Reddy has done well to respond positively and quickly to the demand for handing over the case to the CBI — the name of his son, Jaganmohan Reddy, figures in the First Information Report related to the murder. However, the TDP chief and former Chief Minister, N. Chandrababu Naidu, and Dr. Reddy owe it to the people of Andhra Pradesh to earnestly strive, along with other political leaders, to stop the murderous politics of revenge. Among other things, a code should be evolved to bar persons with a gangster background from getting the party ticket to contest elections. In addition, the Centre and the States must work concertedly to detect and put out of action gangs of hired killers, including those effortlessly crossing State borders to escape the law. The moment major crimes take place district and State borders must be sealed to make sure that the hired killers do not slip out. At a time when the uneasy truce with the Maoists is breaking down and encounters with the police are on the increase, the Andhra Pradesh political arena is getting overheated. The trend needs to be reversed urgently in the interest of the people and the development of South India's largest State.

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