HYDERABAD: A division bench of the High Court on Thursday rejected the plea for re-postmortem on eight Maoists-five women and three men, who were killed in an encounter in the Bottemthogu forest in Bijapur district of Chhattisgarh on March 1.
The bench, however, directed Telangana police to hand over the bodies of the deceased to the family members after taking due acknowledgement from them and also to videograph the process and consent of the relatives be taken in writing.
A division bench comprising acting chief justice Dilip B Bhosale and justice P Naveen Rao was dealing with a petition filed by G.Laxman, president of Civil Liberties Committee, seeking declaration of the killing of eight Maoists by paramilitary forces during a joint combing operation as illegal and in violation of Articles 14 and 21 of the Constitution.
Petitioner’s counsel V Raghunath told the court that the bodies of the eight Maoists were kept at the Bhadrachalam government hospital whose mortuary had adequate facilities to preserve the bodies for a long time. He urged the court to shift the bodies to Osmania General Hospital in Hyderabad.
On the other hand, additional advocate-general of Telangana J Ramachandra Rao said that there was no need of shifting the bodies to the city as the police had made necessary arrangements to preserve the bodies and the post-mortem had been conducted as per the guidelines of the National Human Rights Commission. He said the police had been under pressure from the family members to hand over the bodies.
Maoists Retaliate, three COBRA Commandos Injured in firing
Khammam: Two days after Greyhounds forces of Telangana police gunned down eight Maoists including five women, Maoists on Thursday opened fire at troops of 208 Cobra unit who were conducting combing operations at Dappamadaka forest area under Kistaram police limits of Sukma district in Chhattishgarh. In the firing, a sub inspector Rajveer Singh and two other members of the Cobra unit received bullet injuries. The injured policemen were shifted to Bhadrachalam area hospital of Khammam district for treatment. In the recent incident, Damodar, one of the top Maoist leaders escaped. Cobra troops were conducting combing operations to find out the whereabouts of the escaped Maoists, based on specific inputs. ens