MANGALURU: DNA tests have confirmed the identities of three skeletal remains recovered from Banglegudde reserve forest in Belthangady, Dakshina Kannada, during the Special Investigation Team(SIT) probe into alleged mass burials in Dharmasthala. The remains were identified as those of U B Aiyappa from Kodagu, Adishesha Narayana from Tumakuru and Krishnappa from Kolar.
SIT had recovered 7 human skulls and other remains during combing of the Banglegudde area from where a human skull was earlier taken and produced to the court by the complainant in the case, Chinnaiah, a former sanitation worker who had claimed to have buried several bodies of victims of rape and murder.
After the recovery of the human remains, it was handed over to the police and cases of Unnatural Death Report(UDR) were registered at Dharmasthala police station. The human remains later were handed over to the Bengaluru FSL for further analysis. According to the Forensic experts, all human remains belong to male individuals.
SIT since then has been gathering details of missing complaints registered with State Crime Record Bureau in Karnataka, neighboring Kerala and Telangana and other Southern states especially of those who went missing in Dharmasthala. Based on forensic doctors information on the remains recovered, now SIT is tallying it with the missing cases.
Out of the seven human remains recovered, SIT has now matched the DNA of three of the missing persons. They are - 70-year-old UB Ayyappa of T Shettigeri village, Ponnampet taluk, Kodagu district who had reportedly gone missing seven years ago, as his identity card was found at the site along with the skeletons, 27-year-old Adishesha Narayana, from Gubbi in Tumakuru district, who allegedly went missing in 2013, whose driving license was recovered at Banglegudde by the SIT and 85-year-old Krishnappa from Srinivasapura in Kolar district.
An officer part of the SIT told the TNIE that these three cases are considered unnatural deaths or suicide cases if otherwise there is no way to ascertain the real reason behind their deaths. "DNA matching of three more skulls and various other skeletal remains is underway," he said.