Hyderabad: The Human Rights Forum (HRF) demanded that the state government initiate criminal prosecution against the personnel who participated in the gunning down of six Maoists, all of them Adivasis, who were killed in a shootout on September 5 at the Addagutta forests of Karakagudem mandal in Bhadradri-Kothagudem district.
The criminal investigation into the case must be carried out by either the CBI or an agency independent from the TG state police, demanded Dr S. Thirupathaiah, HRF state general secretary, in a press release on Tuesday. He said that a HRF fact-finding team visited the area on November 13 and spoke with people of several villages and 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,” the HRF said.
He said the police filing an FIR relating to an attempt to murder by the Maoists did not meet the full requirement of the law. 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,” said V.S. Krishna, HRF TG and AP coordination committee member.
The HRF has taken a strong objection to the police not letting the media visit the area where the incident took place. This denial is unprecedented in the context of ‘encounter’ killings in the State of Telangana, Krishna said.
