HRF demands the criminal prosecution of police personnel’s who participated in gunning down of six Maoists at Karakagudem Mandal.

The Human Rights Forum (HRF) demands the criminal prosecution of police personnel, whether the Greyhounds or other agency, who participated in the gunning down of six Maoists, all of them Adivasis, in the early hours of 05-09-2024, in the Bodagutta forest region of Karakagudem mandal in Bhadadri-Kothagudem district, Telangana. The criminal investigation into the case must be carried out by either the CBI or an agency independent from the TG State police.

A three-member HRF fact-finding team visited the area on 13-10-2024 and spoke with people of several villages in the Karakagudem and Pinapaka mandals. Contrary to the police claim, the team gathered that there was no exchange of fire on the day. It was a case of unilateral firing by police personnel upon a Maoist armed squad at the break of dawn in a thickly wooded area.

          As is usually done, the police have filed a FIR relating to an attempt to murder by the Maoists, but this does not meet the full requirement of law. A case in respect of murder and also relevant sections of the SC, ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act has to be registered against the police personnel who participated in the firing that resulted in the six deaths. Whether the accused police fired in legitimate self-defence, as they have been claiming, or the plea of self-defence is invalid, is to be decided in a court of law. The matter must not be closed after unilateral assertions by police officials that it was an exchange of fire that resulted in the deaths. To do so would be a mockery of the law and of the Constitution.

          HRF takes strong objection to the police blocking access to the media, both print and visual, into the area where the killings took place. This denial is truly unprecedented in the context of ‘encounter’ killings in the State of Telangana. What do the police have to hide? Apart from the valid concern of ‘potential contamination of the crime scene’, why should the Press be totally disallowed entry?

          What is also extremely perturbing is the tangible fear among residents in the area, mostly Adivasis of the Koya tribe. Local Adivasis have told us that the police keep constant vigil making it risky to speak out. Also, a team of Civil Liberties Committee (CLC) functionaries who had constituted a fact-finding team were stopped from going to the area in the second week of September; they were detained in several places of Bhadrachalam division.

          The police are only as law-abiding or lawless as the ruling establishment wants it to be. HRF calls upon the Telangana government to ensure that police personnel do not commit illegalities in the course of their brief and that those who do so will not escape accountability. The State government’s recent assurance, of ‘restoring democratic culture’ in Telangana sounds utterly hollow when it greenlights extra-judicial slayings in this manner.

          The police are duty bound to maintain law and order and to meet the violence of the Maoists but must do so only in a manner that respects the rule of law and the rights of the people. The police cannot point to a threat of ‘Naxalite terrorism’ and commit brazen illegalities.

          We call upon both the State and Central governments to stop viewing and treating the Maoist movement as if it were nothing more than an outbreak of criminality. While the Maoist movement uses violence, sometimes considerably, to further its objective, it is essentially a political movement that needs to be addressed politically. It is improper to dump killer forces on Maoists with the blanket licence to exterminate them as if they were wild game.

Dr S Thirupathaiah – HRF TG State general secretary
VS Krishna – HRF TG&AP Coordination Committee member

15-10-2024,
Hyderabad.

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