AP killings: Kin protest with victims’ bodies
11 April 2015 5:18 AM IST
The protesters placed the bodies of the two on road and sought justice. While 12 woodcutters hail from Tiruvanamalai, seven are from Dharmapuri and one from Salem.
Relatives of slain Sasikumar and Murugan staged protests by placing their bodies on road in Padavedu, Tiruvannamalai. They sought a probe and enhanced solatium. A scuffle broke out between the police and the protesters as the latter refused to take away the bodies for cremation.
The district authorities were trying to persuade them to remove the bodies.
A petition has also been filed in the Madras High Court seeking a fresh post-mortem for one of those killed, details of which are yet to emerge.
Protests continued in several parts of the state, including Arakkonam, Hosur and Chennai on Thursday. A group of advocates of Madras High Court burnt effigies of AP Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu and said he should also be included as one of the main accused, besides demanding a Central Bureau of Invetigation (CBI) probe into the incident.
Besides, a Tamil outfit ransacked a retail chain store in Chennai, the founder chairman of which is Naidu. Police have detained two in connection with the incident.
Allegations came thick and fast that the AP police pulled seven out of a bus and then shot them from a point-blank range, later dubbing it as “encounter”. “Seven poor labourers were pulled out of a bus on TN-AP border on Monday. They were among those who were later gunned down,” said Tamil rights activist and coordinator of May 17 Movement Thirumurugan Gandhi.
“These are brutal murders,” he said, adding “justice is what we need for those killed and their families.”
Raja Babu of Kannamangalam in Tiruvannamalai alleged that seven men from his village were taken into custody and then shot by the AP police, while one managed to escape.
However, the Andhra government has dismissed the charge of a fake encounter, contending that police had fired in self-defence.
Meanwhile, the bodies of six woodcutters, who were among the 20 killed by the AP police and forest personnel in Seshachalam forests, will be kept in the mortuary of the government hospital in Tiruvannamalai till Friday morning, as the Tamil Nadu government on Thursday told the Madras High Court that it had no objection for conducting autopsy again.
Jaya seeks probe into shhotout case
Breaking her silence on the Andhra Pradesh shootout in Seshachalam forests, former Tamil Nadu CM Jayalalithaa, in a statement, said she was pained and grieved to hear the news. The former Chief Minister has asked AP Chief Minister to conduct a probe into the incident. “The statements of the activists and seeing the published photographs raise doubts if the AP police were justified in their action,” she said. Even if it can be considered the labourers were involved in the smuggling of red sanders, it remains doubtful if the red sanders anti-smuggling unit had only used the required force, she said. She also granted a solatium of Rs 2 lakh from the party funds to the families of each of the deceased.
Relatives of slain Sasikumar and Murugan staged protests by placing their bodies on road in Padavedu, Tiruvannamalai. They sought a probe and enhanced solatium. A scuffle broke out between the police and the protesters as the latter refused to take away the bodies for cremation.
The district authorities were trying to persuade them to remove the bodies.
A petition has also been filed in the Madras High Court seeking a fresh post-mortem for one of those killed, details of which are yet to emerge.
Protests continued in several parts of the state, including Arakkonam, Hosur and Chennai on Thursday. A group of advocates of Madras High Court burnt effigies of AP Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu and said he should also be included as one of the main accused, besides demanding a Central Bureau of Invetigation (CBI) probe into the incident.
Besides, a Tamil outfit ransacked a retail chain store in Chennai, the founder chairman of which is Naidu. Police have detained two in connection with the incident.
Allegations came thick and fast that the AP police pulled seven out of a bus and then shot them from a point-blank range, later dubbing it as “encounter”. “Seven poor labourers were pulled out of a bus on TN-AP border on Monday. They were among those who were later gunned down,” said Tamil rights activist and coordinator of May 17 Movement Thirumurugan Gandhi.
“These are brutal murders,” he said, adding “justice is what we need for those killed and their families.”
Raja Babu of Kannamangalam in Tiruvannamalai alleged that seven men from his village were taken into custody and then shot by the AP police, while one managed to escape.
However, the Andhra government has dismissed the charge of a fake encounter, contending that police had fired in self-defence.
Meanwhile, the bodies of six woodcutters, who were among the 20 killed by the AP police and forest personnel in Seshachalam forests, will be kept in the mortuary of the government hospital in Tiruvannamalai till Friday morning, as the Tamil Nadu government on Thursday told the Madras High Court that it had no objection for conducting autopsy again.
Jaya seeks probe into shhotout case
Breaking her silence on the Andhra Pradesh shootout in Seshachalam forests, former Tamil Nadu CM Jayalalithaa, in a statement, said she was pained and grieved to hear the news. The former Chief Minister has asked AP Chief Minister to conduct a probe into the incident. “The statements of the activists and seeing the published photographs raise doubts if the AP police were justified in their action,” she said. Even if it can be considered the labourers were involved in the smuggling of red sanders, it remains doubtful if the red sanders anti-smuggling unit had only used the required force, she said. She also granted a solatium of Rs 2 lakh from the party funds to the families of each of the deceased.
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