RAIPUR: The last rites of Nambala Keshava Rao alias Basavaraju and seven other Maoist cadres who were among the 27 killed in Abujhmad area in a fierce encounter with security forces on May 21 were performed in the state's Narayanpur district on Monday.
The funerals were held in Chhattisgarh despite the family members of five dreaded Maoists, two from Andhra Pradesh and three from Telangana, arrived in the district demanding the bodies of the deceased be handed over to them.
The supreme commander and general secretary of the banned outfit CPI (Maoist) was among the eight cremated.
Earlier, following the direction of the Andhra Pradesh High Court, two petitioners, one of them claiming to be relatives of Basavaraju approached the Narayanpur police seeking custody of the bodies after the completion of the post-mortem.
However the Chhattisgarh police declined to hand over the bodies to the petitioners and instead cremated them amid tight security, citing that the claimed relatives could not provide any valid and legal document in support of their claims to take the dead bodies to their respective states.
Speaking to TNIE, a senior police officer in Bastar said, “Andhra Pradesh high court didn't issue an order to Chhattisgarh Police to hand over the bodies to the petitioners. It was only a direction given to the petitioners to approach the concerned police authorities in Chhattisgarh. In total 05 groups of claimants (including two petitioners in the high court) reached Narayanpur but couldn't produce any valid and satisfactory documents to prove their relationship with the deceased Maoist cadres."
"Among the eight bodies, five were found to be invalid claims, two were unclaimed," the officer stated. "Reliable sources informed us that, under pressure from Maoist front organisations and their urban associates, some individuals posing as relatives arrived in Narayanpur to claim the bodies," he added.
According to the officer, this was part of a broader conspiracy orchestrated by Maoists and their supporters to stage an elaborate funeral for their slain leader and cadres. "The police and intelligence agencies acted promptly and lawfully to prevent such glorification, which could have furthered their propaganda," he said.
However, human rights activist Bela Bhatia, who was present in Narayanpur, strongly criticised the police action. She alleged that the rights of the families who had travelled long distances to claim the bodies were violated. "Despite the High Court allowing the petitioners to approach the police in Chhattisgarh to seek custody of the bodies, the authorities denied the families their right to perform the last rites according to their cultural traditions," Bhatia said. "The police conducted the cremations by force, without the consent of the families," she added.
The incident has sparked a debate over the balance between state security concerns and the rights of families in conflict zones.
