Tamil Nadu sand mafia kills honest cop

Tirunelveli: A special branch police constable was done to death by illegal river sand miners near Vijayanarayanam in Tirunelveli district late on Sunday night.

Jegadeesan Durai son of Sebastian of Kelachinhamani village was working as Special branch police constable in the Vijayanarayanam region.

On Sunday night, when Jagadeesan was returning home from dutyat around 11.30 pm, he noticed a tractor smuggling illegally minedsand from Nambiyaru river near Parappadi village. Immediately, he passed the information to the Vijayanarayanam police station and the SB constable was reported to have ordered the tractor driver to stop the vehicle and surrender.

However, the river sand miners refused to stop the tractor and attacked the police constable Jagadeesan on his head with crow bars. Having sustained severe head injury, constable Jagadeesan fell down from his motorbike and died on the spot.

Illegal sand miners dumped the sand at a distance and tried to make the incident seem an accident by hitting the motor bike with the tractor, which was left on the spot.

The Vijayanarayanam police who received information from the public about the Special branch police found dead on the way to the river at Parappadi on Monday morning, rushed to the spot, retrieved the cop’s body and sent it to Tirunelveli Medical college hospital for autopsy.

The Tirunelveli district police superintendent, Dr P V Arun Sakthikumar along with his subordinate officers also rushed to the spot and conducted a spot enquiry.

Later speaking to media, the SP said that preliminary enquiries have established the incident to  e a murder and added that a three-member gang was suspected to have committed the murder.

However, according to other reliable sources from the department, ten suspects have been secured in connection with the murder of the constable.