MADURAI: The prime accused in the Usilampatti police constable murder case, B Ponvannan (27), was shot in the chest and back by police allegedly after he knifed a cop and attempted to escape in the Cumbum forest on Saturday. Ponvannan has been admitted to the Government Rajaji Hospital in Madurai for treatment and is in a critical condition, Madurai Superintendent of Police B K Aravind said. Three other suspects from his gang — Sivanesan, Prabhakaran and Baskaran — were also arrested, he added.
Aravind told TNIE that Cumbum police arrested all four accused persons, including Ponvannan, from Kerala and handed them over to the Madurai police team. “When the Madurai police team took them to an area in Cumbum on the highway in the Western Ghats, Ponvannan took out a weapon he had concealed and assaulted a police constable. He then attempted to assault an inspector who shot him in self-defence,” he said.
Sources said that Ponvannan knifed constable Sundarapandian in the hand and Inspector Anand shot him in self-defence, once in the chest and twice in his back. Ponvannan was taken to the Government Medical College Hospital in Theni for first aid before being shifted to GRH in Madurai, police said. GRH sources said Ponvannan is unconscious. Sundarapandian is being treated in a government hospital in Cumbum.
Family receives constable’s body, holds final rites
Ponvannan and members of his gang allegedly murdered Usilampatti head constable B Muthukumar (34) on Thursday after an altercation at a Tasmac bar. Six special teams had been formed to nab the accused.
On Friday, Muthukumar’s family blocked the road in front of the Usilampatti government hospital, refusing to accept his body. They had urged Chief Minister M K Stalin to announce a solatium and provide a government job to a member of Muthukumar’s family. They received his body on Saturday and he was cremated in his native village with police honours.
Former minister R B Udhayakumar, who offered his condolences to the head constable’s kin at their home on Saturday, told reporters that the Tamil Nadu government should consider the death of a police personnel a serious matter. “The state should declare a compensation of Rs 1 crore to the family members. Besides, in order to safeguard their livelihood, the government should also offer a government job to one of them,” the senior AIADMK leader said. State police should establish a station extension in the locality where Muthukumar was killed, he said, as residents claimed three murders had taken place there. He also urged the government to close nearby Tasmac outlets.