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Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh

Seenu murder: SHRC indicts State

Special Correspondent

Orders payment of Rs. 5 lakh as compensation to Seenu’s wife

HYDERABAD: In a strong indictment of the government, the State Human Rights Commission held that the officials were grossly negligent in protecting the life of Moddu Seenu and ordered payment of Rs. five lakh as compensation to his widow, Lakshmi Rajyam.

The SHRC ordered payment of the compensation following admission by the Director General of Prisons of negligence on the part of the jail staff in allowing the dumb-bell to remain in the barracks. Moddu Seenu was killed inside Anantapur jail on Sunday.

The commission asked the government to pay up the amount by November 30 and report compliance to it the next day. The panel headed by Justice B. Subhashan Reddy delivered the judgement on Friday evening after receiving comments of the Director General of Prisons. The commission had earlier taken suo motu cognizance of the killing of Moddu Seenu and asked the Director General to file his reply urgently. The Director General stated that retention of the dumb-bell on the premises was prohibited and its non-detection was also a major lapse on the part of the administration. It could not be detected as no effective searches were carried out in the barracks by the warders or their supervisors.

Moreover, the jail staff did not follow the norm to segregate convict prisoners from remand prisoners and confine them to separate barracks. It was also revealed that Omprakash (remand prisoner) and Moddu Seenu (convict) were quarrelling with each other for a few days prior to the incident. The administration failed to take note of the problem. Justice Reddy noted in his judgement that there was no need to carry out any further inquiry following the admission by the Director General in the context of human rights of Moddu Seenu. “He was in the custody of the State which was liable to protect his life. The officials of the State were grossly negligent in protecting the life of the prisoner and the government is vicariously liable for the negligence of its employees,” he observed.

He left it to the government the option of recovering Rs. five lakh from the jail staff who were guilty of negligence.

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